Nothing But Air
by kodoku na oujo
Summary: When one dies, the soul looses all its memories of its time spent on Earth. But what if that soul is not ready to die? Can Naruto find a way to get back to the world of the living? Can he make it back to his family, friends... lover? NaruSasu
1. The Death

**For some reason I love writing fics about high school. Maybe it's just a secret desire of mine to be somehow always in high school? It also has a supernatural twist. Supernatural stuff is awesome, ne? Actually the story reminds me a little of Yu Yu Hakusho. Well the first part of the series. Not the whole "spirit detective and demons" thing. Well enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, much to my dismay.**

**Warning: Another Boy Love warning. Aren't you guys tired of hearing that from me? Language too.**

**Important ((last note I promise)): This fic is dedicated to the very awesome SasuNaru1025. I hope you enjoy this especially!**

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Today was a day like every other normal day that came before it. The people of the city happily continued on with life contently as they walked along the sidewalk or drove their cars through the busy streets. Everything seemed at ease with the city.

That is, until now.

A gunshot was heard throughout the area around Konoha High School. People stopped in their tracks as the loud noise echoed through the air. And on pure instinct, the people soon gathered around a small group of four kids, who had been standing behind the high school building. One kid had a gun in his hand. Steam coming from the end, showing that the gun had been used only moments ago. Another boy was lying on the ground, blood gushing from a fresh bullet wound in his chest.

It was not long after that were the sound of sirens heard coming closer and closer to the scene. The three kids still standing heard the sirens and began to run. However their escape was becoming harder, considering the large amounts of people who were assembling together to catch a glimpse of the body on the ground. The three kids soon found their way out of the crowd and fled to the surrounding neighborhood in hopes of avoiding the police.

The sirens came closer until they reached the large group of people. The EMTs burst through the back doors of the ambulance and pushed their way through the crowd to check the body. One of the EMTs then knelt down beside the boy and looked over the wound. He then put his fingers on the boy's neck to check for a pulse. There was barely one.

He then signaled the others to bring over a stretcher so that they could get the body to a hospital as soon as possible. The wound had not pierced through the boy's heart, but he could still die from loss of blood if they did not move quickly.

The body was then placed into the ambulance. The door closed behind the EMTs and then drove off toward the local hospital.

The people who had crowded around merely watched in horror as the ambulance with the boy's body continued to drive on until it was out of sight.

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A tall, tan, blonde boy opened his blue eyes slowly. A bright light caused him to quickly close his eyes again. After his eyes adjusted to the intensity of the light, the blonde looked around. All he saw was blue sky with several clouds scattered throughout.

"Wha… Where am I?" He asked as he continued to look around. The answer the blonde sought came quickly as he looked below him. What he saw made his eyes snap open as wide as they could possible go and his jaw drop open.

For the blonde had to be a good fifty meters above the ground.

"WHAT THE HELL?!" He yelled as he squirmed in mid air, afraid that if he did not move he would fall to his death. "W-W-What's going on?! What the hell happened?! Why am I floating?!" Questions kept pouring out of the boy's mouth.

"If you would just stop yelling for a moment I could tell you that." A feminine voice came from behind him. The blonde stopped his yelling and frantic movement; he turned his body around to look upon the owner of the voice.

"Who… who the hell are you?" The tan boy asked the woman (who was also floating) in front of him. She wore a traditional red, gold, and white kimono and sandals on her small feet. Her complexion was pale, yet elegant and she had stunning emerald eyes. But the feature that stood out the most would have to be her pink hair (that she had pulled up in a clip).

"Haruno Sakura, at your service." The pinked-haired girl gave a sweet smile. She giggled as the blonde continued to stare in awe. "That's one question down. Next."

"Uh… right." The tall boy stuttered. He then blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "Um why are you floating?"

The girl then giggled once again, but covered her small mouth her elegant hand. "You're floating as well." She replied back as she continued to smile at him when he blushed out of embarrassment. "_We_ are floating because technically we are both dead."

The boy's big blue eyes widened once again. "D-Dead?!" he shrieked; his voice became slightly higher than normal.

"Yes. Dead. To be more precise, you are a spirit who has recently died."

The blonde paused for a moment to let that statement register in his mind. "I died." He whispered more to himself than to Sakura. _'I don't remember dieing.'_ He thought to himself. _'Wait! I can't remember a thing! Nothing! I can't remember _anything_!!'_

"Why can't I remember anything?!" The tan boy then shouted suddenly.

Sakura jumped back a bit. The sudden loud noise had frightened her a little. "That is a rule of death. Once a spirit leaves its body, it loses all memory of its mortal life." The pink-haired girl said calmly. "Go ahead and see. What's the last thing you remember before waking up?" She gave a smile as she leaned closer to the boy in front of her.

He paused. The blonde tried his hardest to remember something. Anything. "I don't remember anything. Not even my name."

"That's normal. Don't feel bad. The memories may or may not come back. It really depends on the person and their attachment to their mortal lives."

The boy listened to her explanation and held back the question that was tugging on his lips until she finished. "So I'm a ghost."

"Not a ghost yet."

"Yet?" The blonde questioned as he raised an eyebrow.

"If you continue to stay here on Earth then you will eventually become a ghost and you will be bound to this place for ever." Sakura smiled as she spoke of the gruesome fate. The boy figured she must have been used to saying such morbid things or she would not be able to smile so sweetly.

"So are you a ghost?" He asked, still pondering the last answer he received.

"Me?" Sakura pointed to her face as an expression of confusion graced her rounded face. "No." She chuckled. "No I am a Shinigami. Actually, I'm a guide." The boy's blank expression made her laugh. She then decided to explain the matter a little farther. "I guide the dearly departed to their eternal resting place in the afterlife. Which explains why I'm here for you."

"What?!" The blonde panicked. "I don't want to die!!"

The girl looked over the boy for a moment before speaking. "You are unusually attached to your mortal life." The tall boy wanted to ask how she was able to detect such a thing by looking at him, but he kept his mouth shut. "We should take a look at your body."

"Body? But it's right here." The blonde then patted his chest to prove to Sakura that his body was there.

"I meant your human body. You're dead. Your soul has left your body, so we need to find it." Sakura explained. She then looked around the city. "You died recently so our best bet would be the site of your death or a hospital." She then noticed the hospital below them. "Well, since we're here, let's check this hospital first." The Shinigami then grabbed the blonde by his wrist and pulled him down toward the hospital.

The tan boy freaked out completely as the two of them passed right threw the cement walls of the hospital. He decided that it would be hard to get used to being without a physical body. "Do you have any idea where my body is?" He asked after they passed threw a few rooms.

"Not really." Sakura answered truthfully. The blonde's eyes became wide once again. "But your body shouldn't be too hard to locate. After all, your unruly blonde hair, blue eyes and funny whisker marks will make you stand out." Sakura laughed a little when then blonde blushed once again.

"Well you stand out too!! With all that pink hair!" The tan boy said in his defense.

"True. But I have not had a human body for many decades." Sakura countered back.

"Old hag." The boy said under his breath. He had not even realized that Sakura had heard him say that until her fist connected with the back of his head.

"I prefer 'Sakura.'" She said with a fake smile.

The two then continued to float from room to room in search of the blonde's human body. The pair had searched through three floors of rooms and had yet to find anyone that even looked remotely like the tall boy. Once they were on the fourth floor, the boy's patience began to wear thin.

Sakura either did not notice how irritable and bored the blonde behind her was or did not care. She continued to search endlessly through the many rooms.

"We're never going to find my body." The boy sighed.

"So?" The pink-haired girl asked. "It's not like you have anything that you could be doing at this moment."

'_Touché.'_ The blonde thought as Sakura continued to pull him from room to room. He was just about to complain once again when the Shinigami stopped dead in her tracks, which caused the blonde to collide into in her back. "I-Itai." He said as he rubbed his face. "Why did you stop so suddenly?"

Sakura turned her head around so that her emerald eyes could meet his beautiful blue ones. "I've found your body." She smiled at him and then turned he attention back to the sleeping body that no doubt belonged to the blonde beside her.

"Oi! That is me!!" The tall boy paused for a moment as he looked upon his human body. He cringed slightly as he saw the condition his body was in. Several tubes were going into his skin and he had an oxygen mask over his mouth. He then snapped out of his thoughts and looked at the clipboard that was left hanging on the end rail of the bed. "Uzumaki Naruto." He read the name that was written on the very top of the sheet. "So that's my name. Yeah I think that fact is coming back to me."

Sakura then leaned in closer to look over the sheet on the clipboard. "That would explain it." She said after reading over the paper.

"Explain what?"

"Why you seem to be more attached to your mortal life." The Shinigami then turned to face Naruto once again. His attention was completely fixed on her at this point. "It would seem that you are not completely dead." Naruto continued to stare at the pink-haired girl. His eyes did not even blink. "You're human body is in a coma, and therefore still has a chance to live."

Naruto's eyes then glittered with what Sakura thought to be hope. "You mean I could live again?!" The tan boy smiled for the first time since he had died. Sakura decided she like his smile a lot.

"There is a chance." Sakura smiled back at the blonde. "Though it is a very slim chance." Sakura then grabbed hold of Naruto's wrist again.

"What are you doing now?" He asked as the two began to float upward threw the ceiling.

"I'm taking you to the afterlife or Spirit World."

"I thought souls only went there when they were dead!!" The blonde exclaimed as he began to panic once again. "You're trying to kill me, aren't you?!"

"My you're a noisy one." The Shinigami said as she smiled back to him. "I'm not trying to kill you. I'm merely taking you there so that I may speak with the lord of the afterlife about your predicament."

Naruto looked utterly confused. "Why would you do that?"

"Your particular case is not one that occurs very often, but it does happen." Sakura explained. She seemed to be doing a lot of that today. But informing spirits about what had happened and what will happen to them was her job, so she was quite used to it by now. "I'm not sure on what to do in such a situation, so I'm going to ask the lord of the afterlife what should be done with you."

As soon as Sakura finished speaking she held out her hand toward the sky and recited an incantation. Once she was finished the sky suddenly began to stir and some kind of portal opened. The two then flew right into the portal, the blonde boy squirming and panicking the whole time.

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**Fun Fact. I was watching Bleach when I wrote this first chapter. Go figure. Hey what do you think about me being nice to Sakura? It's creepy isn't it? Totally unlike me! I'm trying to be nicer toward Sakura. Trying.**

**Don't worry beloved SasuNaru/NaruSasu fans out there. There's not going to be any NaruSaku. Well… I guess there is a little, but trust me. This is a SasuNaru/NaruSasu fic threw and threw!**

**Also I'm sorry the first chapter was so short, but in my defense a lot of information was put into this chapter. That makes up for it right? Anyway, please review!! I love to get reviews and I'm not too proud to beg for them X3 lol!!**


	2. The Catch

**Ah, chapter 2. This story actually turned out a lot different from my original idea. Maybe one day I'll write that different idea as an oneshot or something. Maybe… that is if enough people are interested in hearing it XP lol.**

**Last thing. I'm going to be updating both of my stories every other week. So this week _Nothing But Air_ will be updated and next week Just Not Enough will be updated. So each story will have two updates per month. This will be a temporary thing until my life gets a little less packed-full of crap I need to do.**

**Disclaimer: If I sewed Kishimoto-sensei for ownership of Naruto, I would be laughed out of court. My self-esteem is low enough, thank you. So Naruto still belongs to Kishimoto-sensei.**

**Warning: Language and Boy Love. Reasons: I can't go five minutes without cursing ((damn it lol)) and I love Boy Love far too much to not put in my stories.**

**Important: Still dedicated to SasuNaru1025. What? You think I would only dedicate the first chapter to her? No way, she much too cool for just one chapter!**

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Sakura and Naruto flew straight up into the sky as they appeared out of the strange portal. Naruto stopped screaming when he noticed that they were safe and unharmed. He really should not have worried so much on the latter considering they were both already dead.

The two spirits then flew toward what look to be a castle floating in the sky. Naruto looked in awe at the spectacular building. He then wondered how such a large structure could float in the air as it did, but he shrugged the thought off by remembering that so many weird things had happened after he died. Floating castles were the least of his worries.

The two spirits soon floated down to the main gate that led into the giant castle. Sakura landed gracefully on the stone road that surrounded the castle, while Naruto's foot slipped on the stone road and he fell on his ass.

"Itai." Naruto mumbled as he stood up and rubbed his lower back. Sakura did not take notice of her blonde companion's discomfort and walked toward the large, wooden gate in front of her. She knocked on the door twice and then called out to the people who were supposedly behind the large gate.

"Haruno Sakura is reporting in to the Afterlife Palace(1)." The pink-haired girl said. Her tone was slightly louder than it had been before, but Naruto suspected it was to make sure that some one would hear her. "I've come to meet with the Fifth Grand Lord(2)."

After the Shinigami finished speaking, the large, wooden gate creaked and then continued to open slowly until it was open just enough for a person to pass through. Sakura quickly walked into the gate. Naruto stared in awe for a moment until he realized that Sakura was no longer with him. He then fumbled when he tripped over his own foot, but quickly regained his composure and followed quickly behind the pink-haired girl.

"So who is this Fifth Grand Lord?" Naruto asked as he caught up to Sakura. "Why do we have to go see this person?" Naruto had several other questions he wanted to ask, but he thought that overloading the Shinigami with questions would be rude.

"The Fifth Grand Lord is the fifth ruler the afterlife has been privileged to have. The Grand Lord is responsible for overseeing where every soul goes once they've died." Sakura explained as she walked quickly down the long, dark hallway. The only light sources in the hallway were the very few torches attached to the walls. "And we are going to see the Fifth Grand Lord to see if there is a chance that you will be able to live once again."

"Can't I just… I dunno, go back into my body?" Naruto asked unsure if he used the correct terms. Being dead was very confusing to the blonde.

"Your soul will not attach to your body that easily." Sakura replied back. She continued to keep her gaze forward and focus on the long hallway. Another large, wooden gate could be seen in the distance. "There are certain conditions that only a Grand Lord would know."

"I understand." Naruto sighed in defeat. _'Do things really have to be so complicated in the afterlife?'_ he thought as he hung his head down in defeat. Since his gaze was directed down at the ground he did not see Sakura had stopped in front of him. His head collided with her back and made the blonde jumped back slightly. "Tell people when you stop." The tan boy grumbled as he rubbed his head.

"Watch where you're going." Sakura said as she forced a smile to her lips.

Naruto could feel the bloodlust radiating from the pink-haired Shinigami. Sakura then turned her attention back to the wooden gate. She walked up to the gate and once again knocked upon the door with her elegant hand twice.

"Haruno Sakura." The Shinigami repeated her name once again. "The Fifth Grand Lord should be expecting me." Her voice grew louder to make sure that her presence was known.

"Yes. Please come in." Another female voice said as the door began to open. Once the large gate was open completely Sakura began walking, once again with Naruto behind her. When the two of them were in the room completely the gate closed behind them. This room was much brighter than the hallway there were in moments ago. The walls were white and the floor was tiled with pale green marble squares. "Welcome back, Haruno-san."

The owner of the voice stood up from the desk she was sitting at and then walked up to the pair. The woman pushed a strand of raven hair behind her ear and then smiled at Sakura and Naruto as she gestured the two to follow her.

"Tsunade-sama is expecting you, Haruno-san. Am I to expect that this is the boy whose soul you were to supposed to collect?" The raven-haired woman said as she looked back at Naruto and then to Sakura.

"Hai." Sakura replied simply. Naruto did not dare say anything. Everything was still so new to him and he did not want to accidentally anger someone important. The woman's smile grew kinder as she looked at Naruto once again.

"I'm sorry. I haven't introduced myself." The raven then stopped walking and bowed to Naruto. "My name in Shizune. And you are?"

Naruto then bowed as well; he was a little nervous around this woman. "My name is Naruto. Uzumaki Naruto."

"So, you have already remembered your name?" Shizune said as she rose.

"Um, not exactly. I only know it because we found my body and my name was on a clipboard." Naruto rubbed the back of his head as he gave a nervous laugh.

"It's all right." Shizune said reassuringly as she continued to walk forward. "Your memories will come back to you. No one can be sure when since it differs from spirit to spirit."

Not long after Shizune finished speaking to Naruto did they come to another set of doors. These doors, however, were not wooden, but seemed to be made of some sort of metal with red paint over the metal. Shizune then opened the door slowly and then went to stand by the door once it was completely open and gestured for the two to walk in.

"Tsunade-sama is right this way." Shizune smiled at them as they passed through the red doors. Shizune then closed the doors behind the two of them. The pair found themselves in a room almost identical to the one they had just been in. The only difference was that instead of a desk being by the right wall it was place in the center of the room.

Sakura walked up to the desk and Naruto followed close behind her. "Tsunade-sama." Sakura said as she bowed. "I've brought the boy's soul." The large, leather chair that sat behind the desk turned around to reveal a woman who looked no older than thirty years old. The woman laid her head in her hand as her elbow rested on her desk.

"So this is him, eh?" Tsunade asked; her voice sounded completely bored. "Doesn't look like much. Must have been completely by luck that he even has a chance to live again." Naruto forgot his plan to not offend anyone and lost his temper completely.

"At least I'm not some stupid old hag!" Naruto shouted as he pointed his index finger toward Tsunade. Sakura looked at the tall boy in horror. Tsunade just stared at the blonde boy and her eyebrow visible twitched.

"Old Hag?" Tsunade questioned as she stood up and walked around her desk.

"Ah… Tsunade-sama! H-He didn't mean that!" Sakura waved her hands in front of her chest as she spoke. The pink-haired Shinigami then elbowed Naruto in the ribbed. "Apologize right now." She whispered harshly.

"She insulted me first." Naruto retorted as he crossed his arm in front of his chest. Tsunade then stopped when she stood beside the tan boy. She scowled at him for a moment, but then smiled.

"You're interesting, gaki." She said as she ruffled his unruly hair. "I'll give you that much. So you still want to live, do ya? Well, let's see what we can do for you." Tsunade then sat back down at her desk and preformed a few hand signs before a scroll appeared in her hand.

"S-Sugoi!" Naruto exclaimed. Tsunade chuckled at his enthusiasm. She then opened the scroll and began reading from it. There was a long silence between the three of them. Naruto wished some one would say something. Anything. He just wanted the silence to end.

After a long paused, Tsunade laid the scroll down on her desk and looked back up at Sakura and Naruto. "I have good news for you, gaki." Tsunade said with a smirk. "There is a definite chance that you could go back to living." Naruto's face brightened up as he listened to Tsunade's words. "Of course, there's always a catch." Naruto's smile disappeared from his face.

"What do I have to do?" Naruto asked. His tone was low and serious. Tsunade's smirked grew bigger.

"In order for you to return to your body and go back to the land of the living, you have to recovery your last memory." Naruto remained silent and Sakura stood in awe.

"You mean he has to—" Tsunade then cut Sakura's statement off.

"Hai. In order for you to live again, you have to remember how you died." Tsunade's smirk did not falter as she spoke. In fact, it only grew smugger. "But I have total confidence in you, gaki." Tsunade added before she leaned back in her chair. Her elbow was placed on the armrest and her hand held her head up once again. "I'm sure you'll be able to do it."

"All right!" Naruto yelled as he pumped his fists into the air. "Let's take me back now so I can remember my death as soon as possible!!"

"One second, gaki." Tsunade smirked once again. "There's one thing I forgot to mention. It's not really important, but it might be helpful." Naruto suddenly became silent and listen intensely to Tsunade. Tsunade's expression became serious and she then sat up straight in her large chair. "You only have one week to remember your death. If you don't remember it by the time seven days has ended, then you will lose your chances of living forever."

Naruto was dead silent. One week. That's all he had. There was not going to be a second chance. If he screwed this up, then that was it. He would be dead. Forever. He was not sure why, but for some unknown reason, Naruto felt like he could not die yet. There was something or some one keeping him from staying dead.

"Do you still want to try?" Tsunade asked as she folded her arms on her desks. Naruto was silent for a moment or two. The blonde then looked into Tsunade's honey eyes and gave her a big grin.

"Of course I'm going to try!" He said; his voice was full of confidence. "That'd be just plain stupid if I didn't even try to live again. That would be like admitting defeat and I'm not going down without a fight!"

Tsunade smiled at the tan boy in front of her. "Of course. You may try to recover your memory of your death. But be careful. If you recover all of your memories then you'll become a ghost and will lose your chances of living as well."

"I already told you, I'm not going to die that easily!" Naruto replied back as he slammed his hands down on Tsunade's desk.

"That's not very convincing, seeing as you're already dead, gaki." Tsunade smirked as the tall boy fumed in anger. "But I think you'll be able to do it. I have faith in you. Besides, if you fail, we'll be seeing a lot more of each other." Tsunade's smirk turned more malicious.

"That's sure is motivation." Naruto said under his breath. Sakura then elbowed him in his ribs once again. "Will you stop that?"

"Show so respect to the Fifth Grand Lord and maybe I will." Sakura did not smile for once. Instead, she looked more as if she was pouting.

"Sakura-san." Tsunade said suddenly.

"Hai!" Sakura answered the woman.

"I want you to look after the gaki while he's on Earth. I don't want him getting into too much trouble when he's down there." Tsunade smiled at the pink-haired Shinigami. She knew good and well that this would irritate the girl, but she had to find entertainment somewhere. Tsunade resisted the urge to laugh as Sakura's body tensed and her hands clenched themselves into fists. "Understand?"

"Hai, Tsunade-sama." Sakura replied. She tried her hardest to hide her irritation, and it work for the most part.

"All right then. We're done here." Tsunade said as she waved her wave toward the two standing in front of her desk. "You may leave."

"Goodbye to you too, old hag." Naruto's voice was low and irritated. Sakura hit him in the head and began to walk away.

"Good luck, gaki." Tsunade said as her eyebrow twitched once again. "You'll need it."

Before Naruto could reply to that statement, Sakura pulled him by his arm out of the Fifth Grand Lord's office and back into Shizune's office.

"Good luck, Naruto-kun." Shizune said as she bowed once again to the two spirits and opened the large, wooden gate to let them back into the long hallway.

"Arigatou." Naruto said as he waved good-bye to the raven and continued to follow Sakura. The rest of the time the two were in the castle, Sakura remained quiet. It was only when the two exited the main entrance gate did she speak. Or rather yell.

"I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M STUCK WITH YOU FOR A WHOLE WEEK!!" Sakura yelled as she waved her arms around frantically.

"I… I didn't know you could yell." Naruto uttered after a moment of staring at the pink-haired Shinigami. "You were super nice when I first meet you."

"That's because it's my job to _guide_ spirits to the afterlife." Sakura snapped. "Not to baby sit them!" Sakura felt like she could pull her hair out. "But it's not like I can do anything about it now." Sakura sighed in defeat and let her head hang and her body slump slightly.

"I'm not that bad, am I?" Naruto asked as he pointed to his face. Sakura turned her head to look at the blonde and was meet with the most adorable pouting face she had ever seen. A faint blushed crept along Sakura's face, but she turned around so that the blonde could not see it.

"No. It's just…" Sakura paused. She debated on whether she should tell Naruto or not. "It's nothing." She decided on the latter. "Let's go so you can go back to living already."

"All right!!" Naruto shouted as he lifted his arms into the air. "Let's go, Sakura-chan!"

"Sakura-_chan_?" Sakura hissed at the blonde.

"Well we're going to be with each other for a week, so I thought he could be friends." Naruto said as he rubbed the back of his neck. "You could call me Naruto-kun."

"Sakura glared at the tall boy beside her. "Never. Naruto it's just fine for me."

"You're no fun." Naruto pouted. Sakura knew from his tone that he was pouting again, and so as to refrain from blushing more she refused to look at the boy.

"Come on. Let's go already." Sakura sighed as she grabbed the sleeve to Naruto's short button-up shirt and started to fly into the sky. The Shinigami made the same hand sign as she did the last time the two were flying in the air and the same portal opened up in the sky. The two then disappeared into the portal, on their way to the mortal world.

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(1) I had to call the place something. I think Afterlife Palace sounds kind of cool, but this is me and I'm the biggest dork I know XP lol.

(2) Three guess as to whom I'm talking about and two of them don't count. Yup. It's Tsunade. I didn't want to call her a Hokage, so I at first thought about calling her the Fifth Kami-sama, but calling her a god sounded weird ((and it would make her ego _far_ too big)). And there might be a little bit on inspiration from Dragonball Z dub in there :nervous laugh:. Grand Lord… Grand Kai. Get it.

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**Again this chapter is kind of short, but at least the plot has been set into motion. And I'm really, really sorry that Sasuke hasn't shown up yet. I'm almost positive that he'll show up wither next chapter of the chapter after that. More than likely the next chapter. So be glad! The SasuNaru/NaruSasu can begin :cheers:!!**

**Please review!! I love to get reviews and the more reviews I get, the more often I update! It's a fair trade, right? Right X3 lol.**


	3. The Beginning

**First off. Sorry for not updating this when I should have. And then being gone for two weeks completely. I have to tell you, my life was hell. Take this advice from me… _never be in a high school musical!_ It _DRAINS_ you! I lost sleep. I ate less. I was literally a walking corpse.**

**Anyway… And so the week starts. Will Naruto remember his death? Why does he feel like he has to live? Why did Naruto die? Will he get into Sasuke's pants? All of those questions will be answered in the next chapters of the story. I feel like this is going to be a short fic. Around 7-10 chapters or so. It sounds good to me. I don't want to have it drag on and on forever. I mean it's a week. The only thing that will make a week's time go on forever is Dragonball Z ((Oh snap moment XD)).**

**Disclaimer: Naruto said he would gladly belong to me. That is, until he saw what I was going to make him and Sasuke do… Have a tea party! But I thought all 12-year-olds had tea parties together XD.**

**Warning: Language and Boy Love. Why? Because I said so. And I'm the author so the story has to do what I tell it to do :3.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. She's awesome and completely deserves this fic and so much more. **

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Naruto and Sakura reappeared out of the portal in the sky. The Shinigami tugged on Naruto's sleeve and pulled him down toward the ground. She then set him down safely on the sidewalk in front of the hospital they had been in earlier that day.

Naruto then noticed that the sky was almost completely dark. "Hey Sakura-chan." Naruto said as he looked up at the pink-haired girl.

Sakura scowled at the friendly suffix the blonde had added to her name. "Hai." She said trying not to sound to irritated.

"Why is it so late now?" The blonde asked as he tilted his head to the side. "When we left for the afterlife it was still pretty early."

"Time flows differently in the afterlife." Sakura said as she looked around at the people walking on the sidewalk. "For instance, five minutes time in the afterlife could equal about an hour of time on Earth."

The blonde scratched his head. _'Again the afterlife is complicated.'_ Naruto thought to himself. "Oh, okay." There was a long, awkward silence between the two spirits. Neither of them knew exactly what to say or what to do. Naruto was the first to break the silence. "So… What now?" He asked as he looked over at the Shinigami once again.

Sakura shrugged her shoulders. "I supposed you try to find things that would help you remember how you died."

"Ya think?" Sarcasm was practically dripping from Naruto's words.

"I'm just trying to help, baka!" Sakura snapped at the blonde. She placed her elegant hands on her hips as she spoke.

"Okay. Okay." Naruto waved his arms in front of him, hoping that the girl would back off and not hurt him. "Well, how would we go about doing that?" Naruto shoved his hands in his pockets.

"Well…" Sakura started to say, but cut herself off and thought. She then stopped floating and landed next to Naruto. She chewed on her thumb as she looked over his features. "You're wearing a school uniform." Sakura pointed out.

Naruto then looked at his clothing for the first time since he had died. He was indeed wearing some sort of school uniform. Sakura then looked at the blonde's face.

"You also have these weird whisker-like scars." Sakura poked Naruto's cheek with her finger. "They kind of look like they were cuts at one point in time." Naruto then touched his cheek with his own hand. The whisker-like marks did feel like scars. "So far the only good clue we have is that you're wearing a school uniform. But since it's so late and school is more than likely over by now, we should visit the schools in the morning."

"Sounds good, but what do we do tonight?"

Sakura thought for a moment. "Our best bet would be to stay with your body for tonight. Maybe someone important to you will stop by tonight. The higher-ranked Shinigami told me once that when a spirit is around people it knew when it was alive, the spirit will be able to remember memories of their lives more easily."

"You didn't tell me this before, because…?" Naruto was getting annoyed with being dead and the spirits that ran the afterlife. They all just loved to annoy him and anything that was worth talking about they "accidentally" forgot to mention it.

"Shut up!" Sakura snapped. "I didn't mention it before, because I don't know if it's true! The higher-ranked Shinigami like to play pranks on the new comers."

"So that would make you a new comer Shinigami, I guess." Naruto looked over at the pink-haired girl.

"Un(1). So what of it?"

"Nothing. I didn't mean anything by it. I just remember you saying that you haven't been alive for a few decades. That's a pretty long time."

"Haven't you been listening? Time flows differently in the afterlife. The several decades that I've been dead have felt more like only a few short months to me."

"All right! I'm sorry for bringing it up." Naruto sighed and let his head hang slightly. "So shall we go into the hospital?"

"Hai." Sakura then grabbed onto the sleeve of Naruto's button-up school uniform shirt and lifted him into the sky. The two passed through the cement walls of the hospital and headed toward the room Naruto's body was in. Luckily Sakura remembered what room that was, because Naruto did not.

When they arrived in the room, Sakura let go of Naruto sleeve and he landed beside the bed where his unconscious body lay. Naruto noticed that no other human was in the room. He then sat down in the chair next to the bed and let his body slump down a little.

"I know it's late at night, but I thought some one would be here to see you." Sakura said as she passed her head threw the door to see if anyone had just left the room or was coming in. "I know you probably won't remember, but did you have any family?"

Naruto thought for a moment. Nothing seemed to come to his seemingly perpetual, blank mind. Only darkness and fog occupied his thoughts. "I'm not sure." Naruto replied after thinking for a long time. "Mostly everyone has a family, so I would suspect that I have one… But—" Naruto cut himself off there. For some reason he did not feel like talking about the certain subject any longer. _'Maybe this is a feeling I normally get when I talk about family?' _Naruto thought.

At that moment, the door to the room swung opened and passed through Sakura's intangible body. A tall, tan man with brown hair pulled up into a high ponytail and a thin scar across the bridge of his nose barged into the room.

"Damn it!" the man cursed as he walked over to the side of the bed. Naruto got up from the chair as the older man sat down in it. "Of all the nights that I had to work late, it had to be tonight." The man paused and then grabbed Naruto's hand. He looked like he was on the verge of tears. "What the hell happened, Naruto?" The man's voice became low as he said that last sentence.

Naruto watched him for a long time before a name came into mind.

"I-Iruka!" He shouted. Sakura looked over at the blonde in awe.

"You remember him?" Sakura was stunned that Naruto was able to recall a person name so quickly.

"Of course I remember him! I can't believe I could forget Iruka." Naruto clenched his fists. "He's my legal guardian. I remember now. I don't have parents. Iruka adopted me when I was seven years old."

"That's great, Naruto." Sakura smiled at the blonde as she raised her fists up to her chest. "Do you remember anything else?"

"No. Sorry. That's all I remember right now." Naruto said as he stood beside Iruka._ 'Umino Iruka.' _Naruto repeated the name over and over again in his head, hoping that it would lead him to remembering other memories.

"That's okay. You remembered that much in less than a day. I'm sure that you'll be able to remember you death in a week's time, for sure." Sakura gave a genuine smile to the tall boy. Naruto returned the smile, but then went back to looking at Iruka. The older man was still holding onto the cold, limp hand of Naruto's body.

He looked absolutely heartbroken to see his adopted son in such a state. Naruto tried to put his hand on Iruka's shoulder, but it passed right through the older man. Naruto then looked at his hand and sighed. He really wanted to be alive again.

"The doctors told me you're in a coma, Naruto." Iruka said after a long silence. The tan man then lifted his head to look at Naruto's peaceful face. "And when people are in comas, talking to them helps, right?"

Naruto himself just wanted to break down and cry. Iruka wanted him to wake up so badly, and there was a chance that we would not be able to do that. Naruto's nails dug into the flesh of his spiritual body. If he was alive, he might have drawn blood from the pressure of his nails against his skin.

"Well, I'm going to come by everyday after work and check up on you." Iruka smile did not reach his dark eyes. "And when you finally wake up, I'll treat you to ramen. How does that sound?" Iruka paused as if he was expecting an answer from the unconscious blonde.

An answer that never came.

"I'll just take that as a yes." Iruka forced a laugh. "I mean, you have never said 'no' to free ramen before and a coma will not change that."

The door to the room opened slowly and mousy looking nurse stepped into the room. "I-I'm sorry, Umino-san." The nurse said softly. "But visiting hours are over."

"Oh, of course." Iruka said as he finally let go of Naruto's hand and stood up from his position in the chair. Iruka gave a melancholy smile to his adopted son and then left the room with the nurse trailing after him.

"Did you hear that, Naruto?" Sakura said; her voice was full hope. "He'll be coming back everyday. That will give you more time around him and then you'll be able to remember more."

"It would be useless to remember stuff around Iruka." Naruto said as he stared at the door to which Iruka had exited. "He asked me what happened. He doesn't know anything about how I died. He wasn't there." Sakura's smile disappeared from her face.

"True. And if you keep remembering things you might end up with all of your memories and then you'll be stuck here as a ghost." The pink-haired girl sighed. "And I thought we finally had a lead."

"We do." Naruto gave the girl a big grin.

"Nani?" Sakura asked as she raised a perfectly waxed eyebrow at the blonde.

"Iruka has to be my only close family, because he's the only one who showed up today. Which means that we would have better luck searching the schools."

Sakura blinked. She did not know that the blonde could possibly deduct all that information from one visit. And here she thought he was a complete idiot. "And that's what I suggested." Sakura smiled as the blonde pouted.

"Just take all the glory, why don't ya." Naruto mumbled. Sakura giggled again. Naruto then sat back down in the chair that Iruka had sat in moments ago. He sighed and leaned his head back. "You really think I'll be able to remember my death in time, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked; his tone became low and serious.

"I have no doubt in my mind, Naruto." The Shinigami smiled at the blonde-haired boy once again. "Besides, if you don't…" Sakura paused so that she could get closer to Naruto. "I'll kill you again, because I'm not putting up with your annoying ass for the rest of eternity." Naruto then laughed at her.

"I'll be sure to remember it then. I wouldn't want to die a second time." Naruto paused for a moment and looked up at the tiled ceiling. "Hey, Sakura-chan. Do spirits sleep?"

"No." was Sakura's simple reply. "Why do you ask?"

"I really want to sleep right now." Naruto whined. Sakura giggled into her hand.

"Well, you can certainly _try_ to sleep, but I won't make any promises that you'll succeed." Naruto already closed his eyes and calmed his breathing by the time Sakura had finished speaking. The Shinigami then decided to look at the window of the small room. She thought it would be rude (and slightly perverted) if she watched Naruto try to sleep.

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(1) It's like saying 'yeah' in English.

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**Uggh! I can't write long chapters for this fic! I'm hopeless, ne? But you know what they say, "Quality over quantity" and this story is holding true to that saying ((I hope)). And yeah I know that Naruto and Iruka have two different family names, but I would think Naruto would want to keep his original family name. Besides, Umino Naruto doesn't sound as cool as Uzumaki Naruto.**

**Please review! They are highly appreciated X3!**


	4. The Boy

**I have to apologize to my faithful readers for not updating in such a long time, but lately I've been getting the feeling that no one was reading my stories. I mean, I looked at my stats for the last chapter of this story and it didn't even get 100 hits. To be honest I'm a very sensitive person when it comes to my writing so I'm discouraged in writing when I feel like no one is reading my work. I'll try to carry on with this story no matter how many reviews or hits I get, because I know there are still faithful readers out there ((at least I hope)). And so... I apologize. Forgive me.**

**I originally thought that this would be a very short fic. My original plan was to have it be roughly 5 chapters, but we're barely on the second day of the week and it's already chapter 4!! And if there's a chapter for each day (at the very least), then that's going to be around 10 chapters. I'm not sure if it will be that long, but I can always hope. And the SasuNaru/NaruSasu will start very soon!! I promise :sweat:!! Don't hurt me!! It will just take sometime before I can get into it. But trust me… It will be worth the wait X3 :laugh:!**

**Disclaimer: I'll own if I feel like it. God… I just don't want the hassle of ownership and all those deadlines that come along with it.**

**Warning: Language and Boy Love. The Boy Love is coming I swear!!**

**Important: Still dedicated to you SasuNaru1025. Sorry there has to be so many NaruSaku moments in your fic. I promise I'll make it better XP.**

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The rays of light from the sun shown through the window and brightened up the entire hospital room. Naruto's eyes opened as the light hit his face. He really wished he had been able to sleep. It would have calmed him down if he had been able to relax his mind and not think about anything. Though, to the blonde's dismay, the sweet release from his tormented thoughts of the approaching week that he craved so much never came.

Naruto sat up and looked over at the pink-haired Shinigami that sat near the window. Sakura turned to Naruto when she noticed he was looking at her and smiled.

"Did you sleep at all?" She asked.

"No." Naruto let a laugh escape his lips. "What time is it?"

"About seven in the morning. We should start now if we want to find the high school that you went to when you were alive." Naruto nodded and Sakura led the way out of the hospital. The two spirits floated outside of the entrance to the hospital.

"Where do we go first?" Naruto asked as he looked around at the people walking by.

"Well we should start with school close by and then we'll look at schools farther away." Sakura looked around the city to find any signs of a school. "Come one, follow me." Sakura said as she began to fly threw the crowded streets of the busy city. Naruto followed quickly behind her.

The first school that the two spirits came across seemed to be a grade school. After making sure that the school was only for younger children, the two of them then continued on their way to find another school.

"What about this school?" Naruto asked when they came to yet another school. This had been the fifth school that they had seen since they left the hospital. "Konoha High School(1)?" Naruto said as he read the name of the school from the large sign on the wall surrounding the building.

"Well, it's already eight-thirty, so most students should be inside already." Sakura said as she looked up at the building. "Let's check inside." The two spirits passed through the locked gate to the school. Once the two of them entered the building, they entered the closest classroom to take a good look at the students.

"So is this it?" Naruto asked as he followed Sakura into the classroom. He then stopped and looked at the students. They all wore the same uniform that he did.

"I think it is." Sakura smiled. "Unless there are two school with this uniform." The pink-haired spirit then pointed her finger at the uniform that Naruto was wearing.

"Don't joke about that." Naruto partially whined.

"Now if we only knew which classroom you were in." Sakura said as she tapped a manicured finger against her cheek. "I supposed we could just go through all the classrooms until you find some one you remember. Although there is always the possibility that you might not remember them, even if you did know them when you were alive."

"Way to make me feel better." Naruto said under his breath. "The important thing is that we found the school. Now let's just do what you said and check out the classrooms." Naruto then passed into the next room before Sakura. He was determined to find something that might lead him to remembering his death.

"If you would slow down I could help you." Sakura placed her hands on her hips as she floated behind Naruto.

"How could you help?" Naruto asked as he looked around the new classroom that the two had entered.

"Well, while you tried to sleep, I took another look at the clipboard at the end of your bed in the hospital." Sakura explained as she continued to float beside the blonde.

"And?"

"I found out that you were 17 years old." Sakura simply replied. "That means you would normally be in your second or third year of high school(2). But I'm pretty sure you were in your second year.

"So we should be checking the second year classes." Naruto said slowly as he exited the room and looked up at the sign at was placed on the outside of the classroom door, which let him realize that they had been looking through the first year classrooms.

"Precisely." Sakura gave a smug grin as the two of them headed for the second year classrooms that were located on the floor above them.

The pair of spirits searched through quite a few rooms. Naruto was now becoming quite irritated. He had stared at almost every person for several minutes and he had not remembered a thing. Things were beginning to look hopeless.

They then came into the last second year classroom. Naruto froze when he looked at the students in the classroom. He knew them.

"I… I think this is my class." Naruto said as he began to look over the students. "Un. This is it! I remember these people!" Naruto's voice showed his obvious excitement.

"Glad we finally found it." Sakura said as she watched the blonde floating around the classroom, gawking at all the teenagers.

"There's Nara Shikamaru." Naruto then pointed to an aloof looking teenager whom had his raven hair pulled into a high ponytail. "Glad to see that he's still a lazy bum. And there's Akimichi Choji. Eating as usual." Naruto pointed to chubby boy that had a bag of chips in his hands. "And there's Yamanaka Ino and Hyuuga Hinata." He pointed out the two girls that were sitting next to each other and talking. Naruto smiled as he noticed Hinata was still the shy little thing and that Ino was still her loud self. Naruto looked around the room once again. "There's Aburame Shino. And there's Inuzuka Kiba next to him. I remember now; those two were dating."

Sakura's face flushed as she listened to the last part of Naruto's rant. The pink-haired Shinigami looked over at the two boys Naruto had mentioned and blushed even more. She then turned her gaze back to the blonde as he continued to name people.

"And…" Naruto paused as he looked at the class again. "Oh and there's…." Naruto stopped talking as he looked upon the person he was about to name. "S-Sasuke." Naruto's voice was now low and soft. Sakura could barely hear it.

"Eh? Sasuke?" She questioned the blonde. "Is he special?"

Naruto stayed silent for a long time. His brilliant blue orbs gazed at the raven-haired boy. Naruto noticed the worried look on the raven's face. _'Does he know what happened to me?'_ Naruto thought to himself as he continued to stare.

"Naruto?" Sakura looked at the blonde with concern. "Are you all right?" Sakura then floated over to the blonde so that she could stand beside him. When she saw the tall boy's expression, her stomach clenched. Tears were streaming down his tan face. "Naruto?" Sakura asked softly.

"I can't believe I could ever forget him." Naruto said mostly to himself. He then wiped the tears away from his eyes with the back of his hand.

"Who is this, Naruto?" Sakura asked as she turned her gaze toward the lonely looking raven.

"He's… He's the guy… I'm in love with." Naruto continued to stare at the boy known as Uchiha Sasuke. A sullen smile then appeared on his lips. "And he loved me back." Naruto clenched his fists, which hung at his sides. With a shocked expression, Sakura returned her attention back to Naruto.

"You… You l-loved him?" Sakura stuttered.

"With all my heart." Naruto let out a laugh as he tried to hold back the tears. "He's the reason why I can't die. I…" Naruto paused, but gave a warm smile. "I don't want to leave him. Not yet."

Sakura looked at Sasuke and then turned back to Naruto. She then gave the blonde a big smile. "I won't let you leave him, Naruto." The Shinigami place her elegant hand on the tall boy's shoulder. "I'd rather face Hell than see you two separated."

"Thanks, Sakura-chan." Naruto said as he looked down at the raven-haired boy once again. Sakura noticed the look on the tan boy's face and stepped away from him.

"Well, I think I'm going to… uh, leave for a moment." The Shinigami said as she scratched her cheek. "I, uh… have some important Shinigami duties to take care of and—" Naruto cut her off there.

"Arigatou, Sakura-chan." Naruto said with a smile. "For understanding."

Sakura then gave the blonde a sweet smile and nodded at him. The next moment Sakura had passed through the cement wall and disappeared from sight. Naruto then bent down to get a better look at Sasuke's face. The blonde boy smiled as he reached out his hand to touch the pale boy's cheek. When Naruto touched Sasuke's flesh, he merely passed through it.

"Right." Naruto said as withdrew his hand. "I forgot. I don't have a body anymore." Naruto let out a nervous laugh. Naruto then noticed that Sasuke kept looking between the empty desk beside him and the door to the classroom. Naruto recognized this action, because his friend Kiba had told him that Sasuke often did this when Naruto was late to school or absent.

He was waiting for him.

Naruto frowned. He wanted so badly to walk through that door with a physical body and give Sasuke a big, goofy grin, just so Sasuke would not have to look so worried. "Don't worry, Sasuke. I'll be back!" Naruto said to the raven, although the boy could not hear a word Naruto said. Still the blonde continued to speak. "I'll be back before you even start to miss me."

Naruto then stood up and passed through the same cement wall Sakura passed through. He then found the Shinigami patiently waiting for him. She then turned to the tan boy and smiled, hoping that the blonde would be in a slightly better mood.

"What do we do now, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked with a little too much enthusiasm. Sakura then tapped her chin with an elegant finger as she thought. The pink-haired Shinigami then looked in the direction of Naruto's classroom.

"Well, I guess we can stay here until school is over. I mean, this is the only lead we have right now and I don't think you would get any more visitors at the hospital during school hours." Sakura paused to judge Naruto's expression. It did not take an idiot to tell that he was excited. "Besides, if you stay here then we might find out something about your death."

"This means a lot to me, Sakura-chan." Naruto gave the pink-haired girl a big, toothy grin as the two of them passed back through the cement wall.

"Well, don't get used to me being this nice." Sakura retorted. "If you die completely, I'm gonna be a bitch to you, because you left such a hottie like this Sasuke of yours all alone."

"Are you hitting on him, Sakura-chan? I don't think he goes for older women." Naruto laughed at his own comment. Sakura then hit him across the back of his head.

"You are such a baka." Sakura uttered under her breath.

The two spirits then continued to watch the classroom from a corner of the room. As they watched on, they saw Yamanaka Ino walk over to Sasuke's desk.

"Hey, Sasuke-kun!" Ino said cheerfully(3). "Did you hear about the shooting that happened yesterday?"

"There was a shooting?" Sasuke asked as he finally tore his eyes away from the classroom door.

"Yeah. They say that it took place right here at Konoha High, but it happened after school ended and all the clubs and sports practices were over so no one knows what exactly happened." Ino then pulled the chair from an empty desk over to where the raven's sat so that she could sit and talk to Sasuke.

"A shooting happened here?" Sasuke's voice sounded slightly panicked. "Did anyone get hurt?"

"I heard that some one got shot and that they're in the hospital." Ino explained. "But I'm positive that no one died in the shooting. It was probably a bunch of those Yanki(4) guys trying to act tough in front of each other."

Sasuke paused and looked at the still empty desk beside him. "Naruto isn't here today. I hope he wasn't—" Ino then cut the raven off.

"Don't even think that! Naruto is fine. He's… He's just sick, that's all."

"Ino, you know just as well as I that Naruto was in a gang." Sasuke's tone was low and serious. Naruto's eyes widened as he watched the scene.

"I was in a gang?" Naruto asked himself.

"I guess it was a good idea to stay here." Sakura mused as she continued to watch Ino and Sasuke talk to one another.

"Fine! We'll visit his house after school and I'll prove to you that Naruto is all right." Ino said as she poked Sasuke lightly on his shoulder. "There's nothing to worry about. You'll see."

Ino then went back to her own seat when their teacher came into the classroom. Naruto recognized the teacher as Hatake Kakashi. The lazy man then started class and Naruto and Sakura continued to observe the classroom from their corner.

**--**

(1) ((It was mentioned in the first chapter too)) I couldn't think of a good name for a high school, so I thought naming one after Konohagakure would be good enough. If there is such a school with this name ((I highly doubt that but…)), I'm sorry I stole the name XP.

(2) I'm using the Japanese school system. They have three years of high school instead of four.

(3) This Ino has given up her crush on Sasuke. Just watching him make-out with Naruto would be enough of a hint to anyone that he's not interested in girls XD lol. Poor Ino.

(4) 'Yanki' is basically a gang member. It technically means juvenile delinquent, but the term is used mostly when talking about some one who is or was, at one point in time, in a gang.

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**Aww… SasuNaru fluffy-ness X3. I never thought I would get the chance to write a story where Naruto and Sasuke were already together. All of my fanfics about it have them confessing their love and all that jazz XD. Huzzah for skipping over the boring part ha, ha!**

**And Sasuke is very OOC in this fic XP. I'm sorry. I just wanted Sasuke to worry about Naruto and that is what happened. Forgive me, Sasuke X/!! He'll start acting like himself when he's not worried about Naruto! And again… it's a short chapter. I hope you all don't mind XP.**


	5. The Discovery

**I'm really sorry that I didn't update JNE for a week or so and was late on this update. I've been really busy and I as for JNE, I was waiting on a contest winner to reply back to me. I'll try to stick to my updating schedule better! I swear!! :sweat:**

**This fic will start getting really confusing because I will be switching between Naruto and Sakura's conversation to the people who are alive talking. If it gets too confusing I'm sorry X/.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own it. If I did, the Naruto gang would be of legal age… and doing things heh, heh X3.**

**Warning: Language and Boy Love. Why? Because I said so. But if this is not your cup of tea, then the back button is ready and waiting for you.**

**Important: Dedicated to the awesome SasuNaru1025. You rock! Just incase you forgot, you do indeed rock hard XD!!**

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The rest of their time at Konoha High School was not as boring as Naruto had thought it would have been. There did seem like times where the class they were observing seemed to go on forever, but Naruto kept both himself and Sakura entertained by telling her about random memories that popped into his head.

When school was finally over the two spirits followed closely behind Sasuke and Ino, who were going to visit Naruto's home right after school let out. The two students were silent for most of the walk to their friend's house. The blonde-haired girl would say something to the boy beside her every now and then to reassure him that Naruto was fine. But it seemed that no matter how hard she tried, nothing would erase his worry.

It did not take very long for Sasuke and Ino to reach Naruto's house. The two students walked up the stairs that led to the front door. Once they reach the stoop that sat at the end of the stairs, they paused. The raven looked over the door with narrowed eyes.

"Don't worry so much, Sasuke-kun." Ino said in reassurance. "He's fine. I… I know he is." Ino then walked up to the door and knock upon the wood twice. The blonde waited for a moment and when no one opened the door, she knocked a second time.

Once again, Sasuke and Ino were left standing before the door to Naruto's house. Ino then put her ear up to the door in hopes of hearing sounds of life on the other side. When Ino heard no sounds on the other side of the door, she turned her attention back to Sasuke.

"He… He's just sleeping." Ino muttered as she looked at the door once again. The blonde girl seemed to be trying to convince herself as well as Sasuke. "Yeah, that's it. He's asleep. He's fine."

"Ino." Sasuke whispered as he watched the girl in front of him.

"Sasuke? Ino?" A voice said from behind the two students. Both Sasuke and Ino turned around to face the owner of the voice. "What are you two doing here?"

"Oh, Iruka-san." Ino said as she forced a smile on her face. "Uh, we just stopped by to see if Naruto was okay. After all, he wasn't at school so we figured he must have been sick or something."

Sasuke noticed that the brunette's small smile disappeared from his face at the mention of Naruto's name. "Uh, well…" Iruka started to say but stopped. The older man seemed to be at a loss for words. "Naruto… isn't sick."

Sasuke felt the knot in his stomach tighten. "If he's not sick, where is he?" Ino asked slowly. "Why wasn't he at school?" Iruka kept quite for a long time. The brunette then looked up at the two teenagers with a sullen expression.

"He's in the hospital." Iruka said as he avoided eye contact with both Sasuke and Ino. "The doctors told me that he was shot and now he's… in a coma."

Ino just stared at the older man in front of her. Her lower lip began to quiver as the blonde tried to hold back the tears that threaten to fall from her light blue eyes. Sasuke stood there for only a moment. He stood frozen in place long enough for Iruka's words to sink in. After a momentary pause on his part, the raven rushed down the steps and began to walk down the sidewalk toward the nearest hospital.

"S-Sasuke! Wait!" Iruka said as the raven-haired boy passed by him. But Sasuke did not listen to the older man. All that mattered was that he got to Naruto as soon as possible.

Sakura and Naruto, whom had both watched the scene while they stood at the top of the steps, stood in awe. Mere seconds after Sasuke took off, Naruto ran after him.

"Naruto!" Sakura shouted as she began to follow the blonde spirit. "What are you doing?! We should look in your house incase something in there brings up important memor—"

"I don't care!" Naruto shouted back at the pink-haired Shinigami. "I may not be able to do anything for him, but I can't just let Sasuke see me like I am all alone!" Sakura stared at the tan boy's back as he continued to chase after Sasuke. A warm smile then forced its way onto her rosy lips. She caught up to the blonde and looked over at him.

"I guess we can always go back there." Sakura said as the two continued to tail Sasuke. "We do know where your house is now and we still have five more days to recover the memory of your death."

"Thanks, Sakura-chan." Naruto smiled at the Shinigami girl, but did not stop following Sasuke.

It did not take long for Sasuke to reach the hospital. The pale boy than ran inside and up to the front desk where a woman with long black hair and glasses hanging loosely on the bridge of her nose was checking out her recently polished nails.

"Can I help you?" The woman asked as she looked up at Sasuke. The raven paused for a moment to regain his breath before answering the woman.

"Can you tell me which room Uzumaki Naruto is staying in?" Sasuke tried to keep his voice down.

The woman stared at Sasuke with her dark eyes for a moment and then moved over to her computer and began typing onto the keyboard with such speed. When the woman was finished typing she looked up at the monitor and then back at Sasuke. "Yes, he's staying in room 4210. That's on the fourth floor." The woman said as she pushed a strand of her raven hair behind her ear.

"Arigatou gozaimasu(1)." Sasuke said as he backed away from the desk.

"You're… welcome." The nurse called out slowly to the pale boy, but he was already gone. Sasuke then ran quickly to the elevator, but it seemed to be taking too long for his liking so Sasuke decided to take the stairs instead.

Once Sasuke had run up four floors worth of stairs he quickly walked through the hallways and his eyes scanned the signs on the doors. Sasuke paused he finally found room 4210. He waited until his caught his breath and then slowly entered the room. When Sasuke looked over at the blonde-haired boy lying in the bed with tubes going into his body, his heart stopped. Sasuke slowly walked closer to Naruto's unconscious body. The pale boy's hands then clenched tightly at his sides.

Naruto and Sakura passed through the walls of the room soon after Sasuke had entered the room. Both said nothing as they watched Sasuke standing beside Naruto's body.

Naruto floated toward the raven, but stopped when he saw tears fall from his eyes. He knew this whole thing must have been so hard for Sasuke to see. He wished he had a physical body so that he could comfort the shorter boy.

"Naruto." Sasuke said softly. Both Naruto and Sakura looked up at Sasuke when he finally spoke. "Why… Why did this happen?" Sasuke finally forced the words out. The raven tried to hold back his tears. "You told us that your gang days were over for good. So why did this happen to you?"

"But they were over." Naruto said softly. Sakura then turned to face the blonde. "I just remembered, the day I told my gang that I wanted out."

"What happened?" Sakura asked as she tilted her head to the side.

"I don't remember much, but I do remember getting the shit kicked out of me." Naruto gave a short, nervous laugh. But his smile disappeared quickly when he looked at Sasuke once again. "It was the day that Sasuke told me he loved me."

Sakura paused for a moment. The pink-haired Shinigami then looked at Sasuke and then back at Naruto. "That's such a romantic story." Sakura said with a small smile. "You gave up being in your gang to be with him."

"Which is why I can't figure out why I would be shot by another member of a gang if I had left my own." Naruto crossed his arms in front of him.

"I guess that's what we have to find out." Sakura sighed as she looked back at Sasuke and Naruto's body. "Has any of this triggered the memory of death?"

"No. I still can't remember anything that happened the day I died."

"That's all right. We've got plenty of time." Naruto then gave the Shinigami a weak smile and then went back to starring at Sasuke.

Said boy was still looking down at Naruto's body. The only sound in the room was the beeping of the heart monitor. The pale boy then took Naruto's tan hand in his own and held it firmly as he bent down closer to the unconscious blonde in the bed.

"Don't leave just yet, dobe." Sasuke squeezed Naruto's hand tightly as he spoke.

"Why did he call you that?" Sakura asked as she pointed her finger at the raven-haired boy in front of them.

"It's just a nickname he calls me. I used to call him 'teme.'" Sakura just stared at the tan boy. "A sign of endearment, really.

"You two are a very odd couple, you know that." Sakura said with a look of disgust on her face.

"Un. I know." Naruto let out a small laugh. He stopped when he heard Sasuke speak again.

"You better come back." Sasuke's voice was soft. "I'll never forgive you if you don't." The pale boy paused for a moment to stare at the unconscious blonde. "Don't leave me. Not yet." Naruto gave a grim smile toward the raven.

"I won't. I promise you that I'll come back." Naruto said to the shorter boy. Even though he knew that Sasuke could not hear him, Naruto felt as if he needed to say it to him.

The door to the room then opened suddenly. Ino came rushing through the door, but stopped when she saw Naruto's body. She tried viciously to fill her lungs with air as she clung the metal handle of the door for support; the poor girl had probably run the whole way here, chasing after the reckless raven-haired boy.

"My gods." Ino whispered to herself. She put her hand up to her mouth to stop her bottom lip from quivering. "He's really… in a coma, isn't he?" Ino asked as she slowly made her way toward Naruto's bed.

"Un." Sasuke replied, though he did not take his eyes off of Naruto.

"I'm sorry, Sasuke-kun."

Sasuke blinked and then looked over at the blonde girl beside him. "Sorry for what?"

"If I hadn't suggested we checked up on Naruto after school you wouldn't have had to see him like this." Tears started to form in the corners of Ino's light blue eyes.

"No." Sasuke turned his gaze back over to Naruto. "We would have found out eventually. And personally I would rather know what's happened to him instead of worrying."

"I-I know, but… But still, Sasuke-kun." Ino said in between sobs. She tried her hardest to hold back the tears. "W-We should have gone t-together. You didn't have to g-go alone, you know."

"I wanted to though." Sasuke replied.

Ino wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "If I had let you do that, you would have molested him." Ino gave a short laugh.

"Maybe I would have."

"I was joking you pervert." Ino's expression became that of disgust. Ino then punched him lightly on his shoulder. "I swear when Naruto wakes up I'm going to tell him you were trying to take advantage of him."

Sasuke paused for a moment. "You really think he'll wake up?"

"Of course he will!!" Ino yelled at the raven-haired boy. "Don't you ever think otherwise! Naruto is stubborn. More stubborn than you at times. He'll wake up all right." Ino then paused and gave the raven a smug smirk. "Besides, he'll want to brag about how he escaped death and how that makes him so great and stuff like that."

"He would do something like that." Sasuke replied with a small smile.

"You mean he _will_." Ino corrected the raven. "Be more optimistic, Sasuke-kun! Naruto will not like to hear that you've been so depressed while he was out cold."

"All right." Sasuke said as took one more look at Naruto's body. "He'll wake up. I just know it." Sasuke paused for a moment and turned to look at Ino once again. "Do… Do you think we should tell the others?" Sasuke said that last statement slowly.

Ino blinked at the raven-haired boy. She then rested her hand on her chin and thought for a moment. "Well, they will think something's up if Naruto misses school tomorrow too. So I think we should. But let's wait until tomorrow. You know, just incase this idiot," Ino then pointed to said idiot lying unconscious in the bed, "decides to wake up before then."

Sasuke nodded in agreement. Ino then walked over to the door of the hospital room and looked back at Sasuke, as if she was asking him if he was coming or not. "I think I'll stay here for a little longer." Sasuke said finally as his gaze drifted back to the blonde-haired boy.

"I understand. I'll see you tomorrow then, Sasuke-kun." Ino then gave the raven a genuine smile as she left the hospital room.

Naruto smiled as Ino left. He was beginning to understand why she was his friend. He then heard the sounds of some one crying and immediately turned to look at Sasuke. When the blonde noticed it was not him, he looked back at Sakura. The Shinigami had turned away from the others in the room and her body was shaking slightly.

"Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked quietly. Sakura jumped when she heard Naruto's voice. "Are you okay?"

"Gomen ne." Sakura said as she wiped a few tears away from her eyes. "It's just that I've never really encountered friends that care so much. That was such a touching scene just now."

"Didn't you have friends like that when you were alive?" Naruto asked as Sakura began to settle down.

"I don't remember my life as a human." Sakura replied calmly. "When I died, I was merely told my name and then escorted back to the afterlife, where I became a Shinigami."

"That must be awful."

"What must be awful?" Sakura asked as she wiped her eyes one more time.

"Not remembering your life. I know I would have felt awful if I hadn't remembered who Sasuke and Iruka and all my friends were. I'd be too lonely."

"Well fortunately enough my job keeps me so busy that I don't have time to be lonely." Sakura replied in a matter-of-fact manner. "Besides, I like it better this way."

"You do?"

"Hai. This way I won't know if I left behind some one important. I'd rather be unaware than be sad." Sakura than gave Naruto a smile, but Naruto did not return the smile.

"When you put it like that it kind of makes you sound like a coward, Sakura-chan." The pink-haired Shinigami then hit Naruto in the head. "Itai."

"Besides, I probably couldn't remember my life now anyway. Even if I wanted to. I died a long time ago. I believe it's been about forty years."

"Old woman." Naruto said under his breath. Of course, Sakura heard him and then rewarded the blonde with another hit to the head.

During the two spirits' little fight, Sasuke sat down in the chair beside Naruto's bed and grabbed onto his hand once again. The raven-haired boy stayed like that until visiting hours were over and he was forced to leave.

As Sasuke was leaving the room he glance once more over to Naruto's unconscious body. "Don't leave." Sasuke reminded the blonde. He then left the room and closed the door behind him.

**--**

(1) Polite way of saying 'thank you' just incase some of you don't know.

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**I can't believe what a bitch I am for breaking up such a mushy couple :tears:!! Ha ha XD, I actually had to pause while writing this because I started crying. I think it's kind of sad that I'm crying over my own story ((but this really is a mushy story, ne?)).**

**Again it's short ((though not as short as the previous ones have been)). I give up. Expect short chapters. If one is actually a normal length for a chapter… BE SURPRISED!!**


	6. The Teacher

**Okay, important note. Since the memories have started coming back to Naruto, I will be writing very short ones in the beginning of the chapters. They'll be telling the pre-coma story and will be in order. I only hope that I'll have enough chapters to write them all XD ha. But if I can't, then I can't. Maybe a side story… Eh. I'll think about it.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. However… I'm in the process of owning a time machine, with which I will go back in time and change that little fact X3 lol.**

**Warning: Language and Boy Love. I told you I get to the Boy Love parts. It just took some time.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasurNaru1025. Your awesomeness is only exceeded by your… Uh… well, I guess nothing exceeds it XD ha, ha.**

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_Naruto walked along the sidewalk slowly. His breathing was slow and haggard. A young couple passed by the blonde-haired boy as he tried to use the brick walls of the buildings to help him move. The tan boy shot the couple an icy stare and the young boy and girl quickly moved away from the teenager._

_And who could blame them. Naruto looked absolutely frightening in his current state. His bright blonde hair was more unruly than usual and had bits of dirt mixed into it. He was almost completely covered in dried blood and bruises. His junior high uniform jacket fell open and was slightly tattered while bloodstains were scattered all over it. The shirt he wore underneath the jacket was torn as well, but not as much as said jacket. Naruto pressed his arms against the stone wall of the building next to where he stood. He paused for a moment to catch his breath._

"_Tch." Naruto said mostly to himself. "Stupid. If you're that afraid, then don't look at me." Naruto's voice was low and coarse. The tan boy was used to the stares. Being in a gang, people tended to look at you differently._

_Naruto tried desperately to move once again, but his feet lost their ability to support the blonde and Naruto fell to the ground. He cautiously pushed himself up into a sitting position. Every part of his body ached. He had just come from a fight, to which his follow gang members had so conveniently forgot to show up._

"_Typical." Naruto said as he wiped blood away from his mouth with the sleeve of his jacket. "They always have me do their dirty work. At least I was able to kick those losers' asses." Naruto let out a short chuckle, but immediately regretted it. An intense pain went through his sides as he laughed. The blonde figured that a rib or two might be broken. Naruto leaned back against the stone wall and sighed. He could brag and say that the fight had been an easy one, but Naruto had to admit that he barely made it out of there alive._

_Naruto's eyes became heavy and he tried with all his might to stay awake. His body lay there in the alleyway limp and motionless. He was just so tired; he felt as if he could sleep for a hundred years. The blonde then noticed a shadow cast over him and he slowly moved his head to face the cause of the shadow. His half-lidded eyes caught a blurry glimpse of a young raven-haired boy, whom seemed to be the most beautiful thing Naruto had ever laid eyes on._

"_An angel." Naruto spoke softly as he let out another small laugh. He noticed the pale skin of the other boy's face turned a light pink tone. Naruto's body then felt much heavier than it did a minute ago for he found that he could no longer keep himself up, and so his body fell onto the sidewalk._

_Naruto saw the boy's lips move as if he was talking to him, but he did not hear any sound at all. For the next thing the blonde knew was darkness and the cold feel of the cement on his cheek._

**--**

Naruto looked longingly at the door of his hospital room. Sasuke had just left and he wanted to follow him badly. But as Sakura had mentioned, since Sasuke does not know how he had die, then it would be a waste of time to follow him the entire week. Even if the blonde did want to live again, he still did not want to leave Sasuke alone. This whole event must have been very hard for the raven and Naruto wished he could comfort him. The tan boy then glared at his body and cursed it for not waking up.

Naruto gaze then drifted over to Sakura. The Shinigami was looking out the window. She saw Sasuke leaving the hospital and could not help but stare. She may be dead, but that did not mean she was not permitted to ogle the living (even if they are already taken).

"Hey, Sakura-chan." Naruto said after a moment of looking at her. The pink-haired girl turned to face him when she heard her name being called. "What do you think we should do tomorrow?" Sakura merely smiled at that question.

"Well it's simple, Naruto." Sakura said with a smug grin. She then looked at the tall boy in front of her to see his reaction to her statement. She nearly fell over when she saw the look of complete and utter confusion on his tanned face. "We'll go back to your school."

"But I thought you said we shouldn't follow Sasuke." Naruto asked as he raised an eyebrow in questioned.

"Ah, but we're not going to follow Sasuke." Sakura smiled. "Do you not remember? Today your friend, Ino, said that there was a shooting at your high school and that someone was in the hospital. Well, _you _were shot and are in the hospital, so it's only logical that you were in that shooting."

Naruto nodded in amazement after Sakura finished speaking. "Yeah, that does make sense." Naruto nodded once again is if he was agreeing with himself this time. "So that means we should look around the school." The Shinigami's eyebrows twitched as the boy in front of her continued to talk as if he had thought of the idea in the first place. She calmed herself down after the blonde stopped talking to himself.

Sakura turned to the blonde as if to say something to him, but the words died in her mouth at the sight of the boy. His eyes that were fixated upon the door to his hospital room had become a duller shade of blue and that big, goofy, grin that was normally seen on his handsome face was replaced by a small frown and lips pursed into a thin line. It was obvious to the pink-haired woman of whom he was thinking.

The Shinigami walked over to the tall boy and lifted her hand as if she were going to place in upon his broad shoulder, but she retracted her elegant hand at the last second. Sakura clenched her fist tightly to her chest and stared at the tiled floor.

'_Naruto.'_ Sakura thought as she looked up at the blonde's figure. When she realized how emotionally involved she had become, the pink-haired girl shook her head (as if to shake out her previous thoughts) and inwardly scolded herself. _'I shouldn't be getting so concerned over this boy.'_ She thought as her emerald eyes continued to stare at the back of his golden head. _'Naruto is nothing but another job. That's all.'_

**--**

"Are we going, then?" Sakura asked in a cheery voice. The two spirits had waited all night in the hospital once again, for they had determined that trying to search for clues to Naruto's death at night would be pointless. The blonde slowly turned his head toward the Shinigami. His mind had been musing over so many different thoughts last night that he had hardly even noticed that Sakura was still with him in the hospital room.

In all actuality, Sakura had been keeping an eye on Naruto's body for most of the night. She had hoped that she might have missed an important scar or injury that might help lead the pair to a new clue. She thought that it would be best to try and occupy her mind with more practical thoughts, for she was afraid that her emotions would get the better of her if she were to focus on Naruto himself, rather than Naruto as her job. Sakura also decided it would be best if she hid her conflicting feelings and just stuck with her sense of responsibility to her job, for the sake of the tan boy beside her. He seemed like he already had a lot on his mind.

"Eh?" Naruto said as the Shinigami pulled him out of his thoughts.

"Well, I was just thinking that maybe we could start investigating around your school for clues since it's so early and most students won't even be at school just yet." Sakura explained as she gave Naruto a big smile.

"Now?" Naruto questioned.

"Yes now." Sakura's tone became annoyed by what she thought to be merely the blonde's lazy attitude. She then gave him a wicked smirk. "Unless you want to waste your entire week and remain a spirit." The Shinigami let her gaze wander to out the window along the back wall of the silent hospital room, for she knew at any moment she would hear the blonde's loud, determined voice, booming with his confidence.

But to her surprise, she did not hear Naruto's voice. Stunned and shocked, Sakura turned her body around to face the blonde once more and saw him staring at his lifeless body that still laid flaccid upon the hospital bed, his eyes fierce and his fists clenched tightly at his sides.

"Naruto?" The pink-haired girl asked softly when the tall boy did not answer her.

"Do you think I can really do this, Sakura-chan?" Naruto's question completely caught the spirit off her guard and made the pink-haired girl pause so that she could fully grasp the question.

"Ano sa… Do what, Naruto?"

"Remember my death in the next four days."

"Of course you can, Naruto!!" Sakura practically shouted before Naruto had even finished his statement. "Don't ever doubt yourself! If you do, you will die!" The Shinigami paused to let herself calm down slightly before she continued on with her speech. "And if you die, what will happen to Iruka? Your friends?" She paused once again. "To Sasuke?"

Sakura saw that the blonde standing before her visibly flinched at the raven-haired boy's name and immediately regretted putting the tan boy through all this torture. The Shinigami then yelled at herself internally for putting her confusing feelings for Naruto before her job to help the blonde get back to his life amongst the living. Once she was done with her scolding of herself, she looked over to where the blonde-haired spirit stood and noticed that his posture had changed. He was now looking over his shoulder so that his brilliant blue eyes meet with Sakura's emerald orbs and gave the Shinigami a determine grin.

He let out a short laugh and then walked over to Sakura. Almost in a sprint, Naruto grabbed Sakura's hand and the pulled her through the brick walls of the hospital.

"Well, then what are we waiting for, Sakura-chan?" Naruto said in his usual over-confident and obnoxiously loud voice. The blonde's return to his normal personality made the pink-haired girl smile and give a small laugh of her own.

"Glad that your back, Naruto." Sakura said in a soft voice as she smiled up at the tan boy pulling her closer toward Konoha High School.

"What was that, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked as he temporarily slowed down so that he could look back at the pink-haired girl to give her a confused look complete with his brow furrowed and a pouting frown on his handsome face.

The Shinigami blushed slightly when she realized that the blonde spirit had heard what she had not meant for anyone to hear but herself. Thinking quickly, Sakura closed her green eyes and turned her face away from Naruto, hoping that the blood in her cheeks would lessen if she did not look at the boy holding her hand. Though, when she thought about Naruto holding her hand, her cheeks just became redder instead of returning to their normal pale peach color. "I was simply just saying that I was glad that you were finally taking this situation seriously." Sakura hoped that her bluff would be enough to fool the other spirit.

"Whatever." Naruto said quickly. Sakura let out a soft growl of frustration from the lack of concern that Naruto seem to have for what the Shinigami had to say. But she simply sighed and then decided to let go of her anger instead of hold a grudge against the blonde, since she knew Naruto was just anxious to get back to his physical body.

The two spirits arrived at their destination shortly after they stopped their conversation and landed behind the large school building. They then floated over to where the yellow police tape that was meant to keep civilians out of the crime scene and glided right through the makeshift barrier.

Naruto immediately noticed a few police officers chatting amongst themselves as the leaned against the brick wall of the school. The blonde could not tell from where he was if they were merely chatting to themselves or if they were discussing the crime at hand.

"So they really do think it was just a typical gang fight." The female officer spoke first. She then looked over at the taller male police officer with her beautiful red eyes as she pushed a strand of long, black, wavy hair behind her shoulder.

"Given the victims history, that's what everyone believes." The male officer then removed a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and took out a single cigarette from the small box. He place it between his lips and lit it with a small lighter that he had pulled out of the same pocket that the cigarette box had appeared from. After it was lit, he removed it from his mouth and exhaled, which caused a small cloud of gray smoke to form around his face. "I mean, the kid was a gang member. At least that's what the teachers had told us."

"We can't exactly trust those teachers' word one hundred percent. They didn't seem to care for the victim very much."

"Their word is the only thing we have to go on right now. Until we actually get some leads on the kids' friends and family."

"Didn't Ebisu-san go to question the victim's father, though?

"Yeah, he left this morning to visit this Umino Iruka at his work office. We haven't heard back from him yet." The male officer then took another puff from his lit cigarette and kept the smoke in his lungs for a moment or two before releasing the gray smoke from his nostrils.

"This would be a lot easier if we already had permission from the school to question the students." The woman said as she musingly twisted a piece of her long black hair around her index finger. "I'm sure his friends and peers would know more about him than the teachers."

"Maybe you just didn't ask the right teachers." A male voice was heard from behind both the officers and Naruto and Sakura, whom were still floating beside the two adults waiting for them to reveal clues about the shooting. Both officers looked over at the mysterious man whom was walking closer to them. He ignored the yellow tape and casually stepped over the makeshift barrier so that he could talk with the two police officers.

"Hey, you can't be in this area, sir!" The woman cried out as she stopped fiddling with her hair and let her hands fall to the sides of her slender figure.

"But I had an appointment to talk with an officer about the victim, Uzumaki Naruto." The man then ran his fingers through his silver hair and gave the two officers a bored expression and a long sigh.

"An appointment?" The man questioned as he removed the cigarette from his lips.

"I was supposed to have one earlier this morning, but unfortunately I lost track of time and was late to the meeting." Signs of recognition of the event in question flickered across the police officers' faces and then they turned to share a surprised glance with one another, before returning their attention back to the silver-haired man.

"So I take it that you are the teacher known as Hatake Kakashi." The woman then pointed to the man standing before her, who seem to be either ignoring what she was saying or just not interested in the conversation at all.

"That would be me."

"So glad you could finally find time to get back to us with your _busy_ schedule Hatake-san." The taller man said with sarcasm dripping from his words as he dropped his cigarette to the ground and stomped it out with his bottom of his shoe. It was easy to tell that the male police officer looked utterly annoyed with the silver-haired man and his poor excuse as to why he did not show up for questioning.

The woman just gave the man beside her a stern look and then focused her red eyes back on the silver-haired teacher once again. "Please don't mind him, Hatake-san. Would you please be so kind as to answer a few questions for us."

"Of course." Kakashi replied and he let his different colored eyes wander back to look at the police officers.

"Please tell us everything that you know about the victim, Uzumaki Naruto."

"How well does this Hatake Kakashi-san know you, Naruto?" Sakura asked after remaining silent and merely listening to the three adults talk amongst themselves for a long while.

"Well, I haven't remembered much of the times I spent with Kakashi-sensei, but I'm pretty sure that I was closer to him than the other teachers at least." Naruto replied, racking his brain for memories of the older man and sighing when nothing in particular came to his mind. The two spirits then quietly continued to observe the police officers' interrogation of the teacher.

Kakashi scratched the back of his neck and stared off into the sky as if he was trying to find the right words to say to the last question that the officers had asked him. "Hn. Naruto. Let's see. How to describe someone like Naruto." He paused once again, as if in thought and then let his different colored eyes return to the two police officers. "He was a good kid. Maybe not the best student in the world, but kind-hearted nonetheless. He was always able to make people laugh and smile. Kind of like a talent of his, one might say."

Annoyed with the silver-haired man's ramblings, the female officer coughed into her hand and decided to ask another question and hoped that Kakashi would give a more precise answer instead of a vague rant. "It is true that Uzumaki-san was in a gang?" she asked seriously.

"Well… he _was_ in a gang." Kakashi stressed his past-tense use of the verb. "But that was a long time ago. From what I understood, he was done with all of that."

"Are you certain?" The woman pressed.

"Very certain. He can thank his friend, Uchiha Sasuke, for getting him to leave all of that behind him."

The two officers' eyes meet for a second and then they continued on with their questioning. "Would you say that Uzumaki-san and Uchiha-san were close?" the man asked as he rubbed his bearded chin.

"Yes."

"Uchiha-san wouldn't possibly be… connected to the shooting at all, would he?" The female officer asked as her red eyes focused intensely on the silver-haired teacher.

Naruto fumed with such intense anger once he heard that question pour from the raven-haired female's mouth. "How dare she say that about Sasuke!!" Naruto screamed. He moved forward slightly as if he was planning on hitting the woman, but Sakura held him back.

"You're still a spirit, Naruto." The pink-haired Shinigami said softly. "That won't do you any good." That seemed to make the blonde stop his attempts to hurt the woman, but it did not help to cease his anger.

Kakashi own eyes narrowed for only a moment when the woman asked him that question. "No. There's no way that Sasuke would ever hurt Naruto." His voice was low and deadly serious.

The woman flinched, but kept her calm expression imprinted on her face. "Well… if Uchiha-san was not involved, do you know any others that may have been?" The raven-haired woman's voice was even with no hint of her initially fear that the silver-haired teacher had sparked within her from his intense stare. One should commend the young woman for the look in Kakashi's eyes could have frightened anyone, especially if they saw how menacing his left eye looked with it blood-red coloring.

"Unfortunately," Kakashi started to say, with his usual nonchalant voice returning to him, but paused to let his eyes wander away from the police officers and over toward where Sakura and Naruto stood. If the blonde had not known better, he would have sworn that the older man was looking right at him. "I don't know anyone who would ever want to hurt Naruto. So I'm also at a lost for who might have shot him."

The two police officers both sighed when they realized that this entire questioning had been a total waste of time. Both had hoped that this teacher would have given them at least some insight as to who the culprit or culprits might have been. But instead all they had learned is that the victim had been apparently well liked or at least did not have any obvious enemies.

"Though, I do believe that he had mentioned the name of a gang that had often gotten into fights with the one that he used to belong to." Kakashi said hesitantly at first.

"Really?" the man asked with newfound enthusiasm. Even Naruto and Sakura, whom had both remained silent for a long while now, found themselves completely interested in hearing the name of the gang that the silver-haired man had mentioned. "Could you please tell us the gang's name?"

"Hn… I believe it was… Akatsuki(1)."

"Thank you very much, Hatake-san." The raven-haired female said as she bowed in respect to the teacher. She rose and wore a very determined expression on her beautiful face. "If you have anymore information that you think will be useful to the investigation, then please do not hesitate to contact either Sarutobi-san here or myself."

"I will." Kakashi said as he turned to leave, but the silver-haired man stopped and turned back to the two police officers standing side by side. "I don't believe I caught your names."

"Oh. Forgive me. My name is Yuuhi Kurenai and my partner here is Sarutobi Asuma." The woman now known as Kurenai pointed to herself and then to man beside her, whom was called Asuma apparently(2).

"I will certainly contact you if I can remember anything else that could help." Kakashi gave a small bow and then left the two officers once again and walked over the yellow tape and disappeared as he rounded the corner of the large school building.

"We have another lead!" Sakura said cheerfully as she turned her toward the blonde and gave him a bubbly smile. She then noticed that the tall boy beside her looked paler than he usually did and that his expression was almost frightened by something that Sakura could not see. "Naruto?" she asked as she floated so that her body was now directly in front of the tan boy.

"Akatsuki." Naruto repeated the gang's name softly to himself, but Sakura was close enough that she could hear his low voice. The pink-haired Shinigami gave the blonde a concern look and cautiously place her small hands on his broad shoulder as a sign of comfort.

"Naruto?" She asked again, even more concerned for Naruto's well being.

The blonde did not answer. His blue eyes widen and showed the extreme fear and anger that was resurfacing from the dark corners of his mind.

--

(1) You had to see this one coming. I mean, the Akatsuki is the closest thing to a "gang" in the entire Naruto series.

(2) Yes. The two police officers are Kurenai and Asuma. I can't help but put them into my stories ((whenever that is at all possible)). They're awesome! And a cute couple X3 hee, hee.

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**Oh! I hope the suspense is enough to kill!! I really wanted to end this chapter on a very intense moment. I guess next chapter you'll understand why poor Naruto is so tormented by the Akatsuki… Or at least, you'll get a glimpse as to why he doesn't like them. And it's not cause they wanted the Kyuubi out of his body XD ha. Sorry but Kyuubi doesn't exist in this universe.**

**Please review! It makes me feel so better about my crapping writing if I get them. I don't even care if they're kind or cruel, at least I'll know that people are reading this story XP! And come on!! Review cause this chapter was **_**long**_**!!**


	7. The Following

**Uggh. Another chapter **_**seven**_**. I hate that number with a passion. I wish I could just skip over that number. Have a chapter six and chapter eight, but no seven. :sigh: Well, it's only unlucky to me so hopefully you all will enjoy this chapter regardless. You should. It has some fluffy moments in the beginning X3 hee, hee. Enjoy.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or anything associated with him. Unless of course you count ramen. Which, in fact, I do** **own and is available for purchase at the price of fifteen cents per package down at your local Shop N' Save.**

**Warning: Boy Love and Language. Those easily offended and repulsed should vacate the area immediately in an orderly and single file line. I SAID SINGLE FILE!! Jeez. The back button isn't going anywhere people. You don't have to rush out like animals.**

**Important: Dedicated to the almighty and all-knowing SasuNaru1025. Bow at her feet and feel grateful that you are privileged to live on the same planet as her!**

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_When he opened his bright blue eyes the first thing that Naruto noticed was the plain white yet unfamiliar ceiling hover above his head. His vision fought to return back to the darkness once again, but the blonde-haired boy willed them to focus on his current surroundings._

_He turned his head slightly to his right and then to his left, taking in the sights of the alien room. It did not take Naruto long to realize that the strange room that he now found himself in was none other than that of a hospital room. They all looked the same. Pale walls, one large window along the far wall, bed separated by curtains that hung from the ceiling, strange machines that would hook up to patient in order to keep them alive._

_Yes, every hospital looked the same. And Naruto should know. For the blonde had been in and out of hospitals because of severe injuries that he had gotten ever since he had joined up with that group of thugs._

_Naruto fidgeted underneath the itchy cotton sheet and then let out a soft sigh in defeat. Iruka had probably found him _again _and had taken him straight to hospital, just like every other time that the blonde had come home battered and bruised. He would always insist to the older man that he was fine, but being the "always worried and always concerned" person that the brunette was, he would simple not listen to his adopted son._

_He let out another sigh and calmed himself down so that sleep could grace him with its presence and take him back into the darkness of his mind._

_Suddenly, the blonde heard a soft intake of breathe and his blue eyes shot open immediately. Naruto frantically turned his head all the way to his right and saw the sleeping form of a small raven-haired boy slouching forward as he sat in a very uncomfortable looking folding chair right beside his hospital bed. The tan boy's face twisted into a look of pure confusion as he continued to stare at the sleeping raven. Naruto then slowly lifted his torso off of the hard mattress, being careful not to reopen any injury that he made have, so that he could get a better look at the boy's face, which was coincidentally hidden by raven locks that hung down on both sides of his face._

_When Naruto finally was able to fully see the boy face, he gasped and almost fell out of his bed. The boy sitting next to him was absolutely gorgeous. His skin as pale as a porcelain doll, which contrasted nicely with his dark raven hair, and his lips thin yet the perfect shade of peach._

_The blonde was at a lost for words from the sight of the boy. His mind finally pulled him out of his stupor and brought the blonde to the real question that was on his mind: Why was this beautiful boy sitting next _him_, Uzumaki Naruto, of all people? The more Naruto wondered about the answer to that very same question, more confused he became. He could not remember much after that big fight that he, which included himself and a few other guys from his gang, had gotten into with a few members from the gang of high school guys that called themselves the Akatsuki._

_Once again, Naruto was suddenly brought from the deep corners of his mind when he heard yet another sound coming from the raven beside him. The pale boy's dark eyes fluttered open gracefully and immediately focused on the blonde boy lying upon the bed in front of him. The beautiful boy quickly rose to his feet, surprised to find that Naruto had waken up already, and backed away from the uncomfortable hospital bed until his small body brushed against the curtain that was partially blocking the bed that lay parallel to Naruto's. His expression was stunned for only a moment, before it became cold and emotionless._

_Naruto decided in that split second that the raven's expression changed that he did not care to see such a lovely face with such a stoic expression._

_The boy said nothing and the blonde did not know how much more of this unbearable and awkward silent he could take before he went completely mad._

"_Hello." Naruto said softly. The sudden noise slightly startled the raven-haired boy, but his stoic expression did not falter for long._

"…" _The raven paused, unsure if he should answer the blonde at all. "Hello."_

"_Why are you here?" Naruto said suddenly. Only realizing after the words had left his mouth that they must have sounded terribly rude. The blonde shrugged off the thought. He couldn't change what he said now._

_The raven scowled. "I just happen to be the person who saved your life." The boy's tone was very haughty and yet so annoyed at the same time._

"_Ha!" Naruto mocked. "Save my life? Should have just saved yourself the trouble and left me to rot."_

_The blonde said that line instinctively for he had grown his hate his own existence after all the years of hurtful stares from other people. Suddenly, his mind recalled a memory, most likely suppressed in his mind, from the moments right before he blacked out. Naruto remembered seeing the same raven-haired boy, whom was standing a meter or so from his bed, hovering over him with a worried expression on his beautiful face._

_Naruto's blue eyes widened slightly and his gaze once again settled on the pale boy beside him. The raven stared back, slightly confused by the blonde's intense gaze and eventually let his dark eyes wander over to stare at a random spot on the wall in front of him._

"_Stop staring at me like that." The pale boy said in an irate tone._

"_Why did you bring me here?" Naruto asked softly._

_The raven-haired boy's expression became slightly surprised by the blonde's question and his pale cheeks turned a dull pink shade from his embarrassment. "I just felt like it." He answered quickly._

"_But I don't even know you."_

"_Hn. Dobe." The raven sneered mockingly at the tan boy still lying upon the hospital bed. "You don't even recognize your own classmate." After a moment to let the statement sink in fully, Naruto noticed that the raven-haired boy was, in fact, wearing the same school uniform that he was wearing, albeit less tattered and bloodstained._

"_You… You go to my school?!" Naruto said in shock._

"_I'm also in your class." Naruto gapped again at the sudden discovery. But no matter how hard the blonde tried to remember seeing the pale boy when he would _occasionally_ go to class, he could not recall the boy's face appearing anywhere in his memories of school. Then again, Naruto really couldn't remember any of his classmates._

"_Sorry. I really can't remember you." Naruto let out a small chuckle as he scratched his cheek, which the blonde had just realized was bandaged up._

"_Tch. Dobe." The raven replied._

"_Oi! Don't call me that!" Naruto yelled back. "Besides, how do I know that you're really in my class?"_

_The pale boy let out a sigh. "You're name is Uzumaki Naruto."_

"_You could have found that out when you came to visit me here." Naruto retorted as he jutted out his lips in a pout._

"_You've only shown up to class once in the past week and twelve times in the last month." The raven-haired boy continued to explain with a completely serious expression on his young face._

"_Sounds to me like you're more of a stalker than a classmate."_

_Naruto laughed at his own statement. The raven blushed and turned his face away from the blonde lying in the bed, his expression changing to that of a childish pout, just like the one Naruto had sported not that long ago._

"_Oh! Right. I still don't know your name." Naruto said suddenly. The pale boy let his dark orbs wander over to the corner of his eyes so that he could glance back at the tan boy for only a moment, and then they returned to staring away from the blonde's smiling face. "Come on." Naruto whined. "It's not fair that you know my name and I don't know yours. I want to be able to call you something other than 'you' all the time."_

_The raven-haired paused for another moment and let his gaze wonder once more over to Naruto's face, which made his slightly flushed cheeks become redder. He then let out s small sigh. "Uchiha Sasuke." The raven stated in defeat._

_Naruto smiled at the name. _'Sasuke, huh.'_ He thought with a huge smile plastered on his young face. "I think I'll be coming to school more often now." Naruto mused to himself in a soft voice. Apparently it was not low enough, because the boy, now known as Sasuke, heard him. The raven then blushed even more as he scowled at the wall, hoping for it to combust purely from his rage and embarrassment._

--

"Wha… What about the Akatsuki?" Sakura asked as she gentle shook the blonde-haired boy, trying to wake him from his thoughts.

"…" The blonde did not answer the Shinigami. His vacant yet terrified stare added to Sakura's worries that Naruto may have not even heard her question to him what so ever. The blonde seemed to far off in his own mind to do much of anything but recall the memories that flooded into his brain.

"Naruto, please! Answer me!" The pink-haired girl's cries were silenced by the loud ringing of the school bell, announcing to all students, both inside the large building and outside of it, that school was now starting and the school gates were closing. Sakura momentarily let her attention drift over to the last group of students run into the building, thankful that they were not locked out of the school and therefore not late to class.

As if awakened from some sort of hypnotic trance, the loud ringing in Naruto's ear pulled him from his own thoughts and left the blonde confused as to what had just happened to himself. Sakura looked back at the blonde and saw Naruto resting his forehead in his tanned hand, his eyebrows pursed together in irritation and his blue eyes wide.

"Naruto?" Sakura asked once again slowly.

"Sorry, Sakura-chan." He said as he let his fingers slip through his unruly blonde bangs and fall back down to his side. "I… I was just remembering something."

"What was it?"

Naruto knew that Sakura, being his guardian of sorts for the remainder of the week, would have asked him that very question no matter what he had done. But that did not mean that the blonde really wanted to tell the pink-haired Shinigami the horrible things that he had just seen in his mind.

Most of the memories that flashed through the tall boy's brain just moments before include many, many fights between his own gang and the Akatsuki. And a few focused almost completely on a certain member of that notorious gang.

The images were far from pretty to say the least.

"Just… Just a fight with that gang." Naruto said as he feigned a smile on his handsome face. "Nothing to worry about, I swear."

Sakura glared at the tall boy. "That wasn't _nothing_, Naruto!" She said sternly. She paused and her features softened with concern for the blonde-haired boy in front of her. "Naruto, you can tell me."

The actuality of it all was that he could not tell the Shinigami. He just refused to do so. No one should have to suffer through the awful memories of the things that the blonde had witnessed, experienced and… done to others. He was so ashamed of himself, though he refused to block the images of his mind. He knew that the memories just might come in handy with remembering his death.

Naruto had hoped that once he head heard the name of his rival gang, he might actually have remembered his death, but, to no avail, he did not. Letting out a sigh of disappointment, he turned his brilliant, blue eyes back to the pink-haired Shinigami, who still sported that expression of genuine concern.

"Trust me, Sakura-chan." Naruto said with a bright smile. "It was nothing that you need to worry your pretty little head about."

Unconvinced but willing to let the subject that was obviously tormenting the tan boy drop, Sakura let out a sigh of her own and leaned her body against the wall. "Did it give you any hints at all though?"

"Well… I could make out the areas where the fights took place pretty well." The blonde replied looking back at the spirit with a look of concentration etched onto his face.

"What does that have to do with anything?" The pink-haired girl asked, truly interested.

"Well, Sakura-chan," the blonde-haired boy started off, proud at the fact that he knew something that the Shinigami did not for once. "Gangs usually start pointless fights with each because they believe that another person in a different gang had trespassed onto their turf. By knowing where the fights happened, I could probably find out where those particular gangs hang out most of the time."

"And by doing so we could bump into the people who shot you!" Sakura finished his speech, quickly catching onto the blonde's point of his speech. Naruto gave the pink-haired girl a nod as she smiled; for it was now her turn to be proud of herself, since he had quickly caught onto the basic thought process of a yanki.

"Exactly." Naruto reassured.

"Then let's go! This is just the lead we need right now!" Sakura then grabbed a hold of the other spirit's hand and began pulling him along the tall cement wall of the school, heading toward the front of the school.

The two spirits were just about to run off into the crowded city in search of the places that Naruto saw in his memories, when a familiar head of raven hair caught the blonde's attention and stopped him dead in his tracks. Naruto's body froze as he looked upon the pale face, whose feature where cold and filled with such hidden pain.

"Naruto! Come on! We need to g—" The Shinigami cut herself off short when realized that the tall boy beside was not listening to a single word she had uttered to him; his attention completely focused elsewhere, making the pink-haired girl quite annoyed. "Come on, Naruto! Stop daydreaming and let's… go." Sakura paused when she looked up at the certain object that had stolen Naruto attention away from her and gave an audible gasp in surprise.

Sasuke stood outside the school's gates, looking up at the large windows filled with students. Sakura could only imagine what was going through the raven's mind at that point in time with the confusing determined yet utterly depressed expression on his face, merely gazing toward the sky.

"That's… Sasuke-kun." Sakura said softly as she and Naruto continued to look on in shock.

The raven-haired boy quickly turned away from the school building and walked across the busy street, twisting and turning his way through the idle cars, backed up in the early morning traffic. Almost instantly Naruto ran after him, ignoring that fact that his spirit body was actually passing through the metal vehicles instead of going around them, with the pink-haired Shinigami trailing close behind him.

Sakura's high-pitched voice continued to call after the blonde-haired boy as he got farther and farther away from her, but he would not stop. Naruto had also noticed the weird expression that the pale boy held upon his young face and the blonde would not be satisfied until he knew why such a look of depression and desperation graced his old lover's face.

Slowly, Sasuke's feet led the two spirits further away from the school and closer to a place that, even though the blonde did not realize it at the time, held such horrid and scarring memories for the tan spirit, whom was still following the raven's every move.

"Naruto!" Sakura called out once again, finally able to catch up to the blonde slightly.

'_Sasuke.'_ The blonde thought frantically to himself as he following the pale boy closer than his own shadow ever could. _'Just where the hell are you going?'_

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**It was a long flashback, ne ((Makes up for how short the actual events of the story was in this chapter))? Well this is the only one that really needed to be this long. The other memories won't be as long ((hopefully)). I believe there are only three other important flashbacks that I really want to write. I'll think up more along the way though. X Oh! I hope I have enough chapters to fit them all in.**

**Oh well. I'll write more chapters. Simple, ne?**

**Okay. Review please! I'm spent for the night. Time to sleep until I can't sleep no more.**


	8. The Akatsuki

**I'm so glad that I'm back on track with this story. I was feeling like my brain had stopped working. I couldn't think of the events that I had wanted to happen in the story and it scared me! I really didn't want to just continue on blindlessly! I mean… this story has a deadline! I can't have Naruto just dawdling around, now can I? No I couldn't. Be patient with me. I really want this to turn out good, so hope that my mind will obey me XD!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. I would have owned him, but damn that Kishimoto-sensei! During the auction, he just kept out bidding me! I'm almost had Naruto too! If only I had more money then I wouldn't need this disclaimer! Damn!**

**Warning: Boy Love and Language. And I guess mention of some gruesome events, but nothing too bad. You should not read this is if you are pregnant, easily nauseated, suffer from neck pain or back, or have weak hearts. But for the young and healthy, step up to the red line and wait for the train to come to a complete stop before entering. Enjoy the ride.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. Yes! Again! I'm sorry that I had to take off a day! But I'm back ((:singing: Shady's back… Tell a friend XD ha)) and I'm better than ever! … Hopefully.**

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"_Hey there Sasuke-chan!" A certain blonde-haired boy teased as he rested his tan chin at the edge of the desk that belonged to raven-haired boy whom he was addressing._

"_Don't ever call me 'Sasuke-chan' again." The pale boy replied as he narrowed his dark eyes at the laughing blonde, who was now taking his seat beside the angry raven._

"_Okay, okay. Don't get your panties in a knot." Naruto joked as he let his body lean back into his chair, while his fingers unbuttoned the collar of his school uniform and making the ugly jacket a little more comfortable._

_Sasuke blushed at the stab in his masculinity. He had gotten used to most of the blonde's perverted statements, but changing how he reacted to said statements would take some time. And four months was just not enough._

_Naruto let out a sigh and mindlessly flipped through one of his notebooks that lay on his desk. "It's so cold out today." The blonde said, changing the subject with ease._

"_Naruto." Sasuke said suddenly; his voice serious._

"_Eh… What is it?" Naruto let his blue eyes open and wander to meet Sasuke's serious glare._

"_Why is it…" Sasuke paused. He could not take how intensely Naruto was staring at him. He swallowed the lump in his throat and continued on with his speech in a softer voice. "Why is it that you've started coming back to school all of a sudden? I mean, you haven't missed a day in practically three months."_

_Naruto was actually speechless for a change. He just stared back at the pale boy, making Sasuke flinch and fidget while the brilliant blue orbs still gazed at him with such focus. The raven tried to avoid his embarrassment and turned his face away from the blonde, hoping to receive an answer soon… But none came._

"_Forget I asked. It doesn't matter anyway—"_

"_Of course it matters." Naruto said suddenly. Sasuke's dark eyes shot wide open and quickly glanced over to look at the blonde's young face in shock. "And if you really want to know," Naruto started once again, finally releasing his intense stare on the raven and let his gaze wander up to the plain white ceiling of the school building._

_The raven did not know if he could take all the aggravatingly long pauses that the tan boy seemed to take so enthusiastically today. Though, he did not realize it, the pale boy even stopped his breathing for the short pause that his friend took._

"_It would have to be because you're here, Sasuke." Naruto answered honestly. Sasuke, overly satisfied and embarrassed by that answer, finally remembered to breath and took in a large breath of air._

"_Because I'm here?" the raven questioned._

"_Yup." Naruto gave his friend a brilliant smile for which he had become famous amongst the female students in the past four months that he actually showed up to school. "During school is the only time I get to see you so I have to come."_

"…" _Sasuke's blushed deepen at the blonde's bold statement and once again let his eyes focus on anything else besides the blonde beside him._

"_Besides. Kiba told me how sad you always look when I'm not around." Naruto teased, ruining the moment completely in Sasuke's eyes._

_Sasuke's dark eyes narrowed at the blonde beside him and stared at him with a gaze filled with such loathing. The raven felt his cheek heat up under the intense blush that Naruto had managed to for onto him. "Dobe." The raven muttered under his breath all while Naruto laughed and bantered on about how adorable the raven-haired boy was when he was embarrassed. As the pale boy let his head turned around so that he could completely avoid looking at the blonde's face, he could not help but let a small smile creep it's way onto his lips._

"_And don't call me that!" Naruto yelled, once he realized what the raven had actually said, causing Sasuke to hold back the fits of laughter that he so wanted to let out._

--

The cool morning air blew silently threw the empty streets, not far from the busy and crowded main streets of the city. To Naruto, it seemed almost like an eternity had passed whilst he and the pink-haired Shinigami had followed a silent Sasuke into the dark forsaken alleyways, just outside the main part of the city.

In Naruto's eyes, the area seemed too tainted and sinister for some one like his Sasuke to even mention in passing let alone to have him walk through it's evil streets so casually like he was now.

Sakura's emerald eyes gazed upon her surroundings, trying to hold back the sheer curiosity that the place had produced within herself. Graffiti covered almost every centimeter of the dirty brick walls of the abandoned and unstable buildings that towered above the two spirits and the pale boy (who was unknowingly acting as the spirits' guide). At times, she found herself falling behind the two boys in front of her, as she had stopped several times to stare at the horrifying, yet interesting sites and people, and having to quickly fly over to the blonde's side once again. The Shinigami gave the raven-haired boy a look of sympathy, for she would never wish for anyone to be alone in a scary place such as this.

But none amongst them knew the true horrors that the dark alleyways held better than the blonde spirit himself, since he used to be one of them.

Naruto's memories of wandering these long forgotten roads came back to him vaguely and he was grateful for that for two reasons. He really could not afford to remember many more of his mortal memories, in fear that he would surrender any chance he had at returning to the world of the living and he knew that if he were to remember more of these cold streets, only pain would come to his mind.

Suddenly, Sasuke stopped dead in his tracks and he looked over to his left from the corner of his eyes. The raven noticed the ten Kanji symbols that had been spray-painted onto the abandoned building beside him in a crimson red color.

His dark eyes narrowed and he walked around the corner of the building with Naruto fast at his heels and Sakura not too far behind the blonde-haired spirit. Sakura watched as the raven-haired boy stopped once again, but this time he stood directly in front of a rusty, metal door, glaring at it like he wished that the piece of metal would simple incinerate.

Sasuke's pale hand grabbed onto the doorknob, twisting the rusting piece of metal and opening the door, with a loud squeak resonating throughout the entire building. Before walking into the pitch-black building, for no apparent reason the raven-haired boy knocked his knuckles against the doorframe, letting the sound echo in the dark building. He then step over the threshold and closed the rusty door behind him (to be more precise, behind Naruto and Sakura).

Nothing but an eerie silent filled the dark room, but Sasuke made no incentive to move, whatsoever, from his spot in front of the door. Naruto's frantic blue eyes quickly moved around the room, searching for what could be hiding in the darkness around him. He certainly did not like the feel of this whole situation and he could not help but constantly wonder as to why the raven-haired boy would want to come to this place. Especially when he should have gone to school instead.

"Naruto?" Sakura asked in a whisper. The Shinigami knew she really didn't need to whisper to the blonde beside her, but for some unknown reason, the pink-haired girl felt that if she spoke any louder Sasuke (or some one worse) would hear her. "What's Sasuke-kun doing?"

The blonde was about to give an answer to the pink-haired spirit's question when the sound of a gun cocking echoed throughout the dark building. Both of the spirits froze in fear, unable to see what was happening. Naruto swore that if he were still alive, his heart would have stopped beating at that very moment.

As he closed his dark eyes, Sasuke kept a stoic expression on his handsome face. "You're not scary anyone, Kisame." The raven stated calmly.

Light filled the dark, windowless building and temporarily blinding the two spirits standing behind the composed raven-haired boy. As Naruto slowly reopened his blue eyes, he stared in horror when he saw several people, whom he was able to clearly remember now, sitting around the large, dirty room. They were people whom Naruto was hoping that he had never remembered and wished that he would never see again.

The members of the Akatsuki.

"Aw, damn." The blue-haired man said in a gruff voice as he lowered the handgun from Sasuke's temple. "I was hoping that would have at least gasped or something."

"You know little Sasuke's too cool to be scared, un." A blonde-haired man said as he sat upon a large wooden crate; a smirk plastered on his face, which was partly covered by his long blonde bangs.

"It's been a hell of a long time since we've seen you around, squirt." A man with slicked back silver hair stated with a small chuckle.

"Yeah. What brings you here, Sasuke?" Kisame asked with genuine curiosity.

The raven was about to answer the question when another voice interrupted him. "Yes, Sasuke. I think we would all like to know that." Sasuke looked up to see a man with auburn hair and many facial piercings along the bridge of his nose. A woman with a white flower held up in her pale purple hair standing close behind him.

"I came here to ask you all something, _Leader-sama_." The pale boy stressed the title with such sarcasm. He obviously did not care much for the leader of the Akatsuki. Naruto, having so many memories flooding back to him all at once, understood the hatred behind the shorter boys words. His blue eyes grew sad, which did not go unnoticed by the pink-haired Shinigami, whom was frantically looking back and forth between Naruto and the scary bunch of cloak-clad gang members.

"Naruto?" she asked softly once again, still thinking that the others would hear her apparently.

"It's nothing." The blonde replied quickly. He couldn't bring himself to answer her unspoken question just yet. For some reason mentioning the horrible event that had sparked Sasuke's hatred for the leader of the Akatsuki seemed to be wrong to say in front of Sasuke. Even if he could not hear the blonde, it still felt wrong.

"And what is it that you wanted to asked." The leader of the Akatsuki asked as he descended the stairs, the only female member following closely behind.

"Did you send anyone to shoot a student at Konoha High School?" Sasuke said bluntly, not wanting to spend any more time in the presence of the auburn-haired man.

"Hn." He almost laughed as an answer to the raven. "Why on earth we I do that. I don't even know any high school students, beside you."

"You knew _Naruto_, Pain!" Sasuke retorted sternly. Sakura gasped slightly in surprise from the raven's frightening tone. The Shinigami could have sworn that the young raven's eyes turned a shade of blood red while he shouted at the Akatsuki's leader.

The fellow members of the gang all froze and remained silent when they heard Naruto's name escape from the pale boy's thin lips. Each one wore a different expression ranging from worried to interested about what had happened to the blonde-haired boy.

Pain glared down at the boy with his eyes narrowed into thin slit. "Now answer me!" Sasuke shouted once again.

"Was Naruto-kun shot?" Kisame said almost stunned to the young raven. Sasuke quickly turned his head back to Kisame with a much softer expression than he gave the auburn-haired leader. He wanted to say something to the taller man, but he could not bring himself to talk about the situation anymore.

"And you think that I did it." It was not a question. The pale boy's fist clenched as the leader of the gang spoke. His dark eyes did not look over at the auburn-haired man; instead he closed them tightly and awaited the answer to his own question. "Unfortunately I did no such thing."

In true surprise, Sasuke's dark orbs opened and widen in shock. He quickly turned his attention to the pierced man and gave him a look that showed his inability to believe in the auburn-haired man's words. "Liar." He muttered.

"It's true. Just because I still hold little Naruto responsible for the lost of the Akatsuki's best member," the room grew more somber as the leader of infamous gang paused. "That does mean that would have him shot." As much as it pained Sasuke to admit it, as he stared onto the taller man's face he knew that he was telling the truth. The raven lowered his head in defeat; he was sure that the Akatsuki would have been behind the shooting, but now he was left with no leads at all as to who was behind Naruto's current state.

"Do… Do you at least know anything about it?" Sasuke said, trying to mask the disappointment that his voice was threatening to show.

"…" The pierced man paused and gave a stern look to the smaller of the two. "No." he eventually replied back, turning his face away.

Sasuke was silent for a long while, clenching his fists in anger that the only lead he could have had as to why the blonde-haired boy was shot was shattered into pieces and left him with nothing. He let out a short sigh and began to walk toward the door, passing in between Sakura and Naruto unconsciously.

"Wait! Sasuke!" the blonde-haired Akatsuki member yelled out to the retreating raven right before he placed his pale hand on the rusted doorknob. Needless to say Sasuke turned around with a confused expression as the blue-eyed man came running toward him.

"What is it, Deidara?" he asked, genuinely curious.

"I'm not sure if it will help, but I have something you might want to know, un." He answered back with a jubilant smirk. Sasuke dark eyes widened and silently urged the other male to continue on with the potentially important information that Deidara withheld. "You remember how much Naruto's old gang and us were always at ends with each other, un?"

"I do."

"Well, me and Sasori-dono ran into Gaara-kun and his siblings the other day and…" the blonde paused with a guilty smile on his young face. "We kind of got into a little squabble."

"What does this have to do with Naruto?" Sasuke asked impatiently as he gave the older man a glare of such intensity that the blonde visible shook.

"I'm getting to it, un." Deidara gave the raven-haired teenager an uneasy laugh as he waved his one hand at the younger of the two. "Well, we got interrupted by the cops and I got carried away and said to them that we would _settle this later_. Well then the three of them said that they were gonna _end it for good_ the next time that we meet, un." The blonde paused and swallowed loudly, feeling a lump form in his throat from the raven's glare of hatred.

"Deidara, what are you getting at already?" Sasuke was practically at his wits end with the annoying man in front of him.

"Well, it could have been a possibility that they wanted to have Naruto join them in the final fight."

"Naruto!" Sakura chirped up joyfully next the blonde haired boy, as she began to turn her gaze away from the Akatsuki member and young raven-haired boy over to the blonde spirit beside her. "Did you hear that?! It might have been someone it your gang that did that to you!"

"…" Naruto did not answer the pink-haired Shinigami. He would have liked to be a happy as she seemed to be, but something seemed to feel off. Memories, from the mentioning of Gaara's name kept flooding into his mind at a rapid pace that he did not entirely feel comfortable with. His spiritual body shook somewhat and Naruto began to panic, but he showed none of this to the cheerful girl beside him.

"Now we can just go find your gang and hopefully we will—"

Sakura never finished her statement. For the next thing that she saw through his horror-stricken emerald eyes was Naruto body began to flicker between visible and translucent over and over again, as if he was merely on a television screen with bad reception thus making the picture fuzzy. The blonde then fell forward and partially fell straight through Sasuke's physical body and lay there on the dirty floor of the Akatsuki's hideout.

Before Deidara could say anything else, the raven's body shivered and Sasuke looked over his shoulder at the closed door. Not seeing anything there, he quickly turned back to the blonde and gave him his usual stoic expression. "Arigatou, Deidara." Sasuke quickly mumbled before he left the decrepit building in a rush, leaving the gang members stunned by his sudden departure.

The Shinigami floated over to the blonde spirit and placed her elegant hands on his shoulders, slightly shaking the other spirit as she tried to snap him out of his current state. A frantic expression graced her pretty face as Naruto began to disappear more often than he was a moment ago.

"Naruto!" she shouted as her green orbs began to tear. "What's going on?! Naruto, please, tell me what's wrong!"

"Nggh." Naruto grunted as his hands clenched tightly into fists. It may have just been Sakura's panic-struck mind playing tricks on her, but it looked like, to her, that the blonde reeling about on the ground was in pain.

"Naruto! Hold on! Onegai!"

As Sakura finished her last statement, tears rolled down her pale cheeks and she made a few signs with her hands and chanted something too softly for Naruto to hear over his grunts. Once the pink-haired girl was finished with her incantation, she held her arms out into the air, the sleeves of her kimono falling over her pale, out-stretched limbs, and the same portal that she had taken Naruto through a few days ago to visit the Fifth Grand Lord opened in the ceiling of the Akatsuki's headquarters, without them even realizing it. She grabbed onto the blonde's limp body and carried him threw the portal in the ceiling, having it close behind her once the two spirit's were safely threw the opening.

'_Naruto!'_ Sakura thought to herself as more unnoticed tears strolled down from her slightly red eyes and onto her cheeks. _'I'm not sure what's happening but… hold on!!'_

* * *

**Isn't the flashback in this chapter so cute :D. I love it. It was really short, but I thought it was an important memory. Why? Because it shows the start of their relationship, don't cha know?! They've been friends for four months and Sasuke's already falling for him. :sigh: Young love. It's so romantic.**

**And what about Sasuke? Huh? A little surprising, ne? Who would have guessed little Sasuke would be associated with gang members so well? Me. That's who XP ha, ha. I was so excited to finally have the Akatsuki playing a big role in a story of mine. I hearts them X3.**

**Oh and what's happening to Naruto, you may ask? Well… you'll have to find out. Though I think it might be too obvious :gloom:. I'm not good at being mysterious, am I?**

**Okay. Review!! Purdy please? I love you long time XD ha.**


	9. The Fading

**I left off at such a thrilling moment last time. I hope not too many people were angry with me ((especially because of the long wait too X/)). I just wanted to create suspense! I swear! Forgive me XD. Oh! And I think there will only be a few more chapters in this story ((maybe around 5-7 more)). Things are starting to wind down and the plot is really heating up! I hope it turns out really good :crosses fingers: X.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. :sounding like a charity commercial: But for a dollar a day, I can give to the Naruto characters what they need the most… Anti-Angst Cream. Those poor ninjas sometimes go through years with nothing but angst.**

**Warning: Boy Love and language. Side effect for those who don't like this sort of thing include: headache, heartburn, nausea, acid reflex, constipation, diarrhea, ring worm, hang nails, arthritis, retreating hairline, inability to control the volume of their voices, and gas… Lots of it.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. Because nobody should go without having a fanfiction dedicated to them… and you're so cool XD.**

* * *

"_Where have you been, shorty?" Temari asked with a suspicious glare over to the other blonde person in the small group in which she was sitting. "It's been months since you've come around here during the morning." Naruto looked up at the taller girl from where he sat with an innocent expression. His fingers momentarily brushed against the still new whisker-like scars that sat along both of his tan cheeks, then lowering his hand from his face down to his side._

"_School." He replied back as if it was the most obvious answer in the entire world._

"_Ha! What were you doing there?" Kankuro blurted out._

"_Uh… learning?" The blonde's voice wavered as he tried to search for answer that would not give himself completely away._

"_Bull shit!" the blonde-haired girl shouted. Her voice was so loud that it made her youngest brother, Gaara, open his light green eyes so that he could peer up at his angry sibling._

"_What can I tell you guys? I wanted to go." The tan boy ran his long fingers through his unruly hair and tried to hide the smile that threaten to force its way onto his handsome face. The three siblings gave the blonde inquisitive glances. Naruto never once, in the entire time that they had known the shorter boy, had he ever said that he wanted to go to school, the very place that used to be filled with nothing but students who hated him and tried to bully him around._

"_Okay, where are you really going?" The brunette said once again, not convinced for a second that Naruto had actually gone to school. "Meeting up with some girl? Huh?" He nudged the shorter of the two and gave him a wink, which made the blonde-haired boy blush in response._

"_I am not meeting a girl! I'm telling the truth!" Naruto yelled back, very flustered from Kankuro's previous statement. "I really did go to school."_

"_Heh. What good is school anyway?" Temari said softly; the depression in her voice was slightly hidden by the sarcastic tone that her voice took._

_Having heard enough of his fellow gang members not evening believing him when he was telling the truth, Naruto rose from his position on the ground and began to walk away from the three siblings. It took the thereof them a moment to even notice that the blonde was leaving (for he paused for a moment when he rose to his feet), but when the did notice, Temari and Kankuro also stood up from their spots on the dirty ground and stared at Naruto's retreating figure, wide-eyed and shocked._

"_Oi! Where the fuck do you think you're going?!" Temari yelled back at the other blonde, whom seemed to not be affect whatsoever by the angry tone in her voice._

"_School." Naruto said calmly. If this was how they were going to act after not being able to see him for a good two weeks at least, then he would rather be with some one that wanted to see him._

_Sasuke._

_He was late. Naruto knew that. He figured almost half of his classes had come and gone already, but he still wanted to go to school. Sasuke had probably worried enough over where his blonde-haired friend currently was anyway and the tan boy did not feel like making the pale boy wait for him any longer than he already had._

_He walked into the classroom and muttered an apology his teacher, Mitarashi Anko, and began slowly making his way over to the empty desk besides a certain raven-haired boy. Sasuke looked up at the blonde, stunned that he had actually shown up to school after he had missed so much of the day already, but quickly put on his stoic mask and turned his attention back to Anko's lecture._

"_Sasuke." Naruto whispered to the pale boy beside him, knowing that Anko couldn't hear the two of them over the sound of her own loud voice (the woman seemed to yell rather than speak while she was teaching)._

_The raven was pulled from the purple-haired woman's speech and looked over at the tan boy beside him with a confused expression. "What is it, Naruto?" he asked, just as quiet as the blonde boy in the seat next to his own._

"_Can I come over you house today." He kept his head low and his gaze focused on the tiled floor behind them, letting his blonde, unruly bangs fall over his beautiful blue eyes. "I… I don't want to be alone today."_

_Sasuke blushed at the sound of Naruto's hushed voice. If the raven had not known any better, he would have sworn that the blonde was trying to make his soft voice sound very seductive and lustful. But Sasuke knew better and pushed the thoughts out of his mind. "Sure." He replied after a pause to try to figure out what exactly had made the boy beside him so upset this morning._

_After school was over the two boys quickly made their way over to the raven's house, both barely able to make a sound let alone talk to the other due to the heavy tension that the blonde's mood had created between the two of them. Sasuke had never realized until now, but it would seem that it was normally the tan boy that usually started their conversation when they were together. He would never admit it to his blonde-haired friend, but he was beginning to miss how crazy and energetic Naruto could be._

_Once inside the large house, Naruto let his gaze wander around the place for a while. He was stunned at the size, décor… everything about the house. It was the blonde's first time ever visiting Sasuke's house and he was actually very surprised that raven-haired boy had agreed to let him come over so quickly._

"_Sorry to ask this of you so suddenly. Coming over your house, I mean." Naruto said with an embarrassed smile on his young face._

"_It's fine." Sasuke replied calmly as he led the blonde up the stairs. "My parents are never home anyway. So it's not like they can really care."_

"_Good point." Naruto gave a short chuckle and then the two boys settled back into silence once, the raven led the two of them into his room._

"…" _Sasuke looked back at the blonde, whom had set himself down on the raven's bed and placed a gloomy expression upon his face. "Naruto? What is it?"_

_Everything happened so suddenly for the young raven._

_In less than a second Naruto had grabbed onto the pale boy's school jacket, pulling his body closer to his own. Sasuke's dark orbs widened as Naruto filled the gap between the two boys' faces and brought his dry lips mere millimeters away from the lips of the other boy in front of him. The blonde paused and stopped himself from going through with the sudden and unprovoked action. Naruto let his head move backward slightly and then let it hang lifeless and his long fingers still held Sasuke's uniform jacket tightly against his palms._

"_G… Gomen."_

_Naruto whispered so softly that the raven-haired boy in front of him hardly even heard the words escape from the blonde's mouth. The reason as to why Sasuke may have not heard Naruto apologize to him would not be just because of the tan boy's soft tone of voice, but also the fact that he seemed to be stunned so badly that his whole being seemed to stop functioning completely._

_His friend… Naruto had just almost _kissed_ him._

_The thought seemed to be unable to fully sink into the raven's mind. He stood there silently, dumbfounded to the point of immobility, with Naruto still attached to his school jacket, neither of them daring to move or speak in fear of the other completely rejected them._

_Another long agonizing moment passed between the two silent teens before either of them finally built up enough courage to finally break the silence and tension that had settle amongst them. Naruto raised his head slightly and let his blue eyes peeked up at his friend through his unruly blonde bangs. He swallowed the large lump that had formed in his throat and stared at Sasuke's wide eyes._

_Finally, the pale raven seemed to snap out of the trance-like state that the almost kiss between his friend and himself had caused him. "Na… Narut—" he began to say, but was cut off when they both heard the sound of Sasuke's bedroom door open._

_In the doorway, stood almost an exact copy (yet older) version of Sasuke, who wore befuddled expression as his dark eyes observed the two young boys standing so very close to one another in Sasuke's bedroom. Naruto's mouth hung open at the sight of the older man. The reason behind this was very simple…_

_He knew him._

"_Y-YOU?!" Naruto pointed his finger at the older boy, while the raven in the doorway pushed back a long lock of dark hair that he held back in a low ponytail and gave the blonde a look of recognition._

"_A—! Aniki!" Sasuke stuttered as an adorable pink tint dusted his pale cheeks._

"_ANIKI?!" Naruto shouted accidentally in his best friend's ear, causing the smaller raven to cover his delicate ears in order to save them from bleeding._

"_Hello, otouto." The older of the siblings said with a nod. He then turned his attention to the frantic blonde beside his younger brother. "Hello there… Naruto-kun."_

"_I… Itachi?" Naruto gasped out._

"_Huh?" Sasuke said as he realized that his older brother and his best friend knew each other._

"_You're brother's a member of the Akatsuki?!" Naruto asked as he tugged on Sasuke's sleeve; his blue eyes wide with shock._

"…" _Sasuke remained silent and then gave the elder Uchiha sibling a look of pure loathing. If it had been any other person besides Itachi, the look that Sasuke gave would have chilled them to the bone or made the person soil themselves. Luckily, the older boy had grown immune to his brother's death glares and merely shrugged it off with an emotionless stare. "Your reputation precedes you, Aniki." The younger raven said bitterly._

"_That it does, otouto." Itachi replied calmly. "But in this case, it is pure coincidence that I have actually meet Naruto-kun before this."_

"_Eh?"_

"_You know how it is, otouto. Gangs are always getting into little squabbles and wh—"_

"_What?" Sasuke asked. "Naruto," the raven turned his attention toward the blonde and glared at him with his dark orbs narrowed into thin slits. "You're not in a gang… Are you?"_

"_I…" Naruto paused and slightly backed away from the pale boy, releasing his school uniform shirt sleeve quickly and let his feet back up slowly._

"_You're in Suna(1), correct." Itachi said in his usual monotone voice. It was not a question. Itachi knew it would be pointless to ask a question to which he already knew the answer. Besides, his darling otouto seemed as if he was going to explode with rage if someone did not answer his own question soon and the elder Uchiha did not want to deal with an angry Sasuke at the moment._

_The two young boys looked over at Itachi for a moment and then went back to staring at one another; one with a glare so intense and the other was trying find the courage to not run away and cry from the pale boy's scary expression. "…" Sasuke said nothing as he continued to gaze upon Naruto for another moment longer. The pale boy then quickly turned away from the blonde and pushed passed his older brother, out his bedroom doorway, so that he could fume in peace and silence._

"_Sasuke!" Naruto called after his friend, but stopped when he was in front of the taller Uchiha sibling. He glanced up at the taller boy momentarily with wide blue eyes and then turned his attention back to the retreating figure of his best friend, his hand slightly extended out in front of his body like he was reaching for the other male._

"_So you didn't tell him." Itachi stated, more to himself than to Naruto, but the blonde was still able to hear the raven-haired boy and his calm and emotionless tone just made the tan boy cringe with guilt._

--

Grand doors burst open as a pair of sprits quickly rushed into the awe-inspiring floating castle that acted as a sort of base or headquarters to the realm of the dead. Sakura still held the blonde-haired spirit in her arms as she let the male's body weigh down on her right side as she propped him up using mostly her shoulder and arm strength. The pink-haired Shinigami did not bother with useless introductions this time as she entered into the large castle. She knew such things such as etiquette did not matter.

Not at a time such as this.

The young woman panicked when she felt her grip on the young spirit begin to slip as her hands began to seep through the boy's spiritual being. The Shinigami had never seen such an occurrence happen before, but whatever had happened to the tan boy in her arms, she knew that, surely, the Fifth Grand Lord would know what to do.

"TSUNADE-SAMA!!" Sakura shouted as she quickly kicked opened the large, wooden doors that led into Shizune's small office right before Tsunade's larger room, since both of her hand were preoccupied with holding onto a slowly disappearing boy.

"Haruno-san?!" the young-looking raven said in concern as she stood from her dress and began to walk over to the two spirits, whom had just so rudely barged into her office.

"Shizune-san!" Sakura replied as she stopped moving for a moment to talk to her superior. "I must speak with Tsunade-sama! Immediately!"

"Haruno-san… what is this all about?" Shizune asked as she followed Sakura while the Shinigami began her short stroll over to the large doors that led into the Fifth Grand Lord's office.

"It's about Naruto."

"Naruto-kun…" Shizune then turned attention to the unconscious blonde spirit that lay lifeless in Sakura's arms. The raven-haired woman was confused as to why the spirit would be asleep until she saw the blonde's form begin to fade almost to the point where Naruto's being seemed like it had ceased to exist completely and then returned to it's visible form. Her eyes widen as she saw the young spirit fade and reappear before her very eyes.

Quickly, understanding what must have happened to the young boy, Shizune ran in front of Sakura and without wasting a single moment threw open the metal doors and led the two into Tsunade's room.

"Tsunade-sama!" Shizune called out as she quickly jogged over to the front of the Fifth Grand Lord's desk. The elder blonde woman spun around in her comfortable, leather chair and gave her secretary a bored look, but her attention was quickly pulled from the raven to the pink-haired Shinigami and the fading blonde spirit that hung at her side.

"What happened?!" Tsunade yelled as she rose from her seat on her leather chair.

"…" Sakura remained silent, for the young-looking Shinigami was at a loss for words and she honestly could not explain what was going on with the tan boy in her arms.

"Tsunade-sama, what we feared has occurred to Naruto-kun." Shizune said, her voice slightly shaky as she tried to steady her breathing and her heart, which seemed to be beating too fast for the raven-haired woman's liking.

"…You don't mean…" Tsunade's honey eyes widened as she realized what the lower ranking spirit was trying to tell her.

"Hai." Shizune paused so that she could take in a deep breath to help stabilize her nerves. "He's recovered too much of his memories. He's starting to become a ghost."

The room was silent for a long while. Tsunade looked away from the three spirits standing in front of her large wooden desk with an angry, yet filled with so much disappointment and depression, look etched onto her young-looking face. Her elegant hands lay in fists along the finished wood of her desk, her nails digging into her skin unable to pierce the spirit form and draw blood that was not in her body anyway.

The pink-haired Shinigami stared at the elder spirits in shock and disbelief. She could not accept this. Naruto could not be turning into a ghost. Not after she had tried so hard to help him over the past couple of days, trying to make him remember his death. Tears weld up in emerald eyes as the Shinigami's grip on Naruto's spirit grew tighter as the thought began to sink into her mind.

A single tear ran down her pale cheek as she turned her head so that she could look at Naruto's unconscious face and stared at the blonde with a look so full of fear and utter sadness. "Naruto." Sakura mostly mouthed to the tan boy since the spirit could not will her own voice to rise louder than a barely audible whisper.

"Tsunade-sama?" Shizune asked, wondering what the blonde-haired woman was going to do.

"Bring him here." Tsunade command once she finally was able to regain her composure and spoke in such a serious and deadly tone that Shizune was a bit frighten to act out the Fifth Grand Lord's command, but the raven quickly took the fading blonde from Sakura's tight grasp and dragged him over to Tsunade's desk.

"What are going to do?!" Sakura practically shouted at the elder spirit as she stormed up to the desk behind Shizune, desperate to stay beside the tan boy's spirit at all times.

"I'm doing what I must so that he may continue to exist." Tsunade said as she brought her hands up to her face and touched the small diamond mark on her forehead and tried to focus on calling forth all her energy. "I'm going to erase Naruto's memory so that he can continue on with his mission."

"YOU CAN'T!!" Sakura shouted as she frantically grabbed onto Tsunade's thin wrists and pulled her hands away from their place in front of her face and pulled them to right below her shoulders.

"Haruno-san!" Shizune yelled as she tried to pry the pink-haired woman's hands off of the Fifth Grand Lord's wrists.

"Don't erase his memory! Don't let Naruto forget! Help him some other way, just don't let him forget!!" The tears that began to pour from the Shinigami's green orbs just started to uncontrollably fall down her face and landed in a puddle upon the finished wood on the Grand Lord's desk. Her breathing was sporadic due to all the crying that young woman was doing and her pale arms began to shakes as her grip on the elder woman's wrist grew tighter.

"Sakura-san…" the Fifth Grand Lord began as she gave the Shinigami a sympathetic look. "You of all people should know that erasing his memory is the only way to spare him the horrible fate of becoming a ghost and being forever trapped on earth."

"Naruto wouldn't want to forget! No one would!"

"Sakura-san… I'm doing this to save him."

"No one wants to not be able to remember their past!" The pink-haired woman then completely collapsed her body on top of Tsunade's desks, her grip on the elder woman's wrists retracting so that now her small, pale hands were merely laying upon the blonde woman's arms. Sakura's face lay against the cold surface of the finished and polish wood as tears continued to pour out of her eyes and created a small pool of water upon the desk.

"Sakura." Tsunade said in a stern voice. "Do not let your past cloud your judgment. This is what is best for Naruto."

"I'm objecting to this because I'm thinking of Naruto, Tsunade-sama!" Sakura lifted her head off of the desk so that she could look into the elder spirit's honey-colored eyes. "Back on earth, Naruto has some one that he loves with all his heart. If he were to forget that person he would never forgive himself. I won't let this boy suffer anymore."

"…" The blonde-haired woman gazed upon the hysterical Shinigami with a look filled with all the pity she held for the young woman. She remembered it had been a short time ago (to the ones in the after life) that she had met Sakura and told her of her fate to become a Shinigami.

Of course, all of that came after the Grand Lord had stopped the pink-haired girl from becoming a ghost herself.

"Sakura-san… Ple—" Tsunade cut herself short when she heard the soft groan coming from beside her. The elder woman looked over at Naruto's supposedly unconscious body with her honey-colored eyes wide in shock as she noticed the young boy's body rise from his place on the Grand Lord's wooden desk.

"Na… Naruto." Sakura practically mouthed out for her voice was so soft that she doubted that anyone had actually heard her call out the tan boy's name. Her emerald orbs peered up at the blonde, growing wider as her tears stopped flowing down her pale cheeks.

The blonde slowly rose into a sitting position, letting his legs dangle over the edge of Tsunade's large desk, and turned his blue eyes onto the elder blonde and gave her the most serious expression that she had ever seen the young boy wear. All three women gazed up at Naruto like he had just grown a second head and had the blonde not overheard their previous conversation he would have brought up that slightly disturbing fact.

But he had other issues that he needed to address first.

"Don't erase my memory." Naruto commanded. The pink-haired Shinigami was surprised to see the blonde look so utterly menacing and serious, aside from his usual bright and cheery manner. Everyone in the room was silent for a time until Naruto once again spoke up with a serious expression still etched onto his young face. "I'd rather become a ghost than forget."

Tsunade was finally able to find her voice and decided that the blonde-haired boy needed to have some sense knocked into his overly stubborn head. "This isn't some game that you can just reset when you fail, gaki. If you recover the last of your memories, not even I will be able to save you."

"I don't care." Naruto replied quickly.

The sudden response took Tsunade by surprise. She was a little taken back by how Naruto was able to say something such as that without even having to think about his response. He was able to say it so honestly that it shocked the older woman slightly.

Silent fell over the Fifth Grand Lord's office once again as the blonde showed no signs of backing down from his demands and the three woman were merely left to stared in awe and confusion as to what possible reason the blonde could have to keep his memories and risk losing the last chance he had at mortal life forever.

Sakura just continued to gaze up at the serious blonde, unable to put her current feelings into words. All she knew is that her heart ached and that she could not understand why the blonde was affecting her in such a manner.

As she continued to let her emerald orbs focus solely on the tan boy she felt her chest flutter and contort until it was slightly aching and wondered what it all meant.

--

(1) I had planned from the beginning of the story that Naruto would so be in a gang with the Sand siblings. I was also debating on whether Haku and Zabuza should be in the gang too, but then I'd have to call it "Mist and Sand" or something gay like that XP.

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**I'm sorry the flashback is so long XP. I didn't want to break this one up. It all went so well together. To have their first "almost kiss" and the introduction of Itachi be in the same memory just fit. Think of this as payback for having shorter chapters in the beginning of this story. And I'm sure that the last few chapters of this will be **_**LONG**_**. Or I'll be a bitch and shorten them and leave of with cliffhangers XD. I wouldn't do that… :thinks:.**

**And omigawd O:! We find out about Sakura's past… well… we find out why she was so touchy about remembering memories. Yeah… :pauses: Review please!**


	10. The Memories

**Okay the last chapter ended kind of… Well I didn't like the ending but I also didn't want to have the chapter super long. I mean, if I made the chapter longer than I would have had less stuff happening the last few chapters. It makes sense to me.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. But I do own two Konohagakure hitai-ates so that has to mean I'm like… _at least _part ninja.**

**Warning: Boy Love and language. Cause that's the way ((uh huh, uh huh)) I like it ((uh huh, uh huh)). That's the way… :music cuts off: Apparently my family doesn't like my singing.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. She's awesome, this story's awesome… My mom thinks I'm awesome. We have lots of things that are in common.**

* * *

_An entire week._

_That is exactly how long Naruto had been absent from school. Ever since that day when he had nearly kissed his raven-haired friend, he had not had the courage to be around said boy whatsoever. The blonde had thought about going to school, but had instead chosen to stay home, telling Iruka, his adopted father, that he was feeling ill and mere moments after the brunette would leave their home for work, Naruto would slip out of the small house and meet up with his fellow gang members._

_None of them questioned why the blonde had suddenly stopped "attending school" as the blonde had claimed. But they all could tell the change that had occurred in the tan boy._

_Naruto had not smiled once in the entire week that he had come to hang out around his fellow gang members.The cheery exterior and carefree attitude that had made up the blonde-haired boy had vanished without a trace as to where the old Naruto may have gone. The three siblings were worried about their friend, but none of them dared to question as to why Naruto was so quiet lately; fearing that he would simply snap on them and try to hurt them._

_On a particularly dull Sunday afternoon, Naruto sat under one of the many bridges throughout the large city, with Gaara, Temari and Kankuro all by his side. The blonde let his head lean back against the rough cement pillar that helped support the bridge and started at the underlining of the small, but wide bridge. His blue eyes seemed distant and his face held a stoic expression in place along his features._

"_So…" Temari said in order to break the awkward silent that the idiotic boys in this gang had created amongst them. "Why haven't you been going to school lately, Naruto." The blonde-haired girl teased as he let her face move closer to the apathetic blonde._

"_None of your business." Naruto calmly stated back, yet his voice held a certain warning quality that told the older girl that digging deeper into the topic would mean certain death. A warning that, of course, Temari ignored for she was not going to be afraid of boy that was a good two years her junior._

"_Aww, come on." She insisted. "You can tell us, Naruto."_

"…" _the blonde did not answer the elder of the two, but simply let his head rise back up and let his distant, blue eyes gaze into her own green orbs. "I said it's none of your business."_

_Temari was just about to pry further about the topic, when all four of the young teenagers heard soft footsteps approaching them. Their attention quickly focused on the source of the footfalls and noticed a familiar black cloak with red clouds embroidered onto the black material._

_With one glace at the long, raven hair and the strange lines that marked the pale face, the identity of the mysterious figure coming ever closer to the small group was known to be none other that the best member of the Akatsuki… Uchiha Itachi._

_Naruto's blue eyes widen at the sight of Sasuke's elder brother and he immediately rose to his feet and began to walk up to the approaching boy._

"_What the fuck are you doing here?" Kankuro asked as he gave the pale boy a look of distaste._

"…" _Itachi remained silent and calm as the brunette began to mutter profanities at him for not answering his question._

"_Hey I asked you a question!" he yelled but suddenly his voice caught in his throat when he heard the sound a gun cocking and saw the pale boy in front of him pulled out the aforementioned gun out of his cloak. The small handgun was then aimed at the small group, though it was hard to see which one of the four it was actually pointed at since the raven was still quite a good distance away._

"_The hell?" Temari muttered under her breathe._

"_What are you doing, Itachi?" Naruto said as the blonde boy fearlessly walked up closer to the elder boy and gave him a look filled with such confusion._

"_Orders from Leader-sama, Naruto-kun." Itachi spoke softly; his voice barely over a whisper, making sure that Naruto would be the only person able to hear what he had to say. "He wants me to kill you all."_

_The blonde paused dead in his track. He could not have heard the elder Uchiha right. He definitely was not here to kill him or his gang members either. None of this could be happening._

"_But I'm not going to do it." Itachi said as his dark eyes seemed to soften slightly while the handgun lowered down to the ground. The three siblings behind the Akatsuki member and the blonde-haired boy stood in awe at what was happening; lost as to what exactly was being said between the blonde and raven._

"_W-Wha… I… I don't understand." Naruto finally muttered out in his confused state._

"_I don't know why Leader-sama wants you dead, but I won't hurt the one person for whom my otouto cares deeply." Itachi stated._

_Blue eyes widened once again, but not due to the fact that Itachi had decided not to kill him, but the fact the elder Uchiha had said that Sasuke "cared deeply" for him. Of course at the time, Naruto did not exactly now what the raven-haired boy had meant by that, but he hoped with all his heart that Itachi had meant that Sasuke returned his feelings for him._

"_Aniki! Don't do it!" Sasuke shouted as he came running toward his elder brother and the blonde boy standing in front of him._

"_Sasuke?" Naruto questioned with a more confused expression._

"_What are you doing here, otouto?" Itachi asked, his voice still calm as ever._

"…" _Sasuke paused as he slowly walked over to his friend and his brother, utterly puzzled as why the two of them seemed to talking to one another rather than trying to kill each other. "I… I followed you to your gang's hideout and overheard Pain tell you to kill Naruto and his gang." Sasuke paused to look over at the rest of the gang members, none of them harmed in any way. "Did I hear wrong?"_

"_No. You heard right." Itachi replied._

_Dark orbs widened and then quickly narrowed within less than a second. Sasuke was about to warn his brother to not follow the orders when his curiosity got the better of him and decided to ask a question that had been bugging him for a while now. "Well, if it's true… why didn't you kill them?"_

"_I saw no point in killing them." Itachi paused and then let his dark eyes gaze up at the gray, cloud-covered sky. "They were all very strong. Barely got out alive from the fight. Unfortunately none of the Suna members were killed." The elder raven then let his gaze peer back down to look into the blue eyes of the still confused blonde-haired boy. "Or at least that's the story I'll tell when I get back. I'll apologize to Leader-sama when I return for not completing my mission."_

_Both Naruto and Sasuke stared at the elder Uchiha in awe at the sudden act of kindness. Neither of the two boys knew what to say such a situation as this, but nonetheless, even if they could not put it into words, they were both equally grateful to the taller boy._

"_I knew you wouldn't do it, Itachi-san." Spoke a voice that seemed to be coming from behind the three siblings. Everyone turned around to spot another person in the same cloak as Itachi whose face was covered by an orange mask with a swirl design leading into a small black hole._

"_Tobi." Itachi said, his voice low and dark. It was obvious to the other that the elder raven did not expect another member of his gang to follow him on his assignment._

"_Leader-sama asked me to make sure that the job was completed. He obvious didn't have a lot of faith in you, Itachi-san." Tobi's voice held a certain cheeriness that seemed completely out of place in the current situation. It made Naruto skin crawl as he listened to the happy voice speak of such a morbid topic._

_Without any warning, the other Akatsuki member held up his one gun and aimed it at Naruto. The blonde gasped and then let himself gaze over at Sasuke through the corner of his eyes, not wanting the younger raven to be here during this dangerous situation._

_Everything happened so suddenly after that. Kankuro, Temari and Gaara had tried to block the older man from hitting his target, they believed to be Naruto, but Tobi was able to pushed all three of them out of the way and onto the hard cement road beneath them. He aimed his pistol back up at the blonde-haired boy and fired one bullet._

_Before Naruto could even react, he heard Sasuke shouted out something, but his ear refused to register what the raven-haired boy had actually said. The blonde thought that the bullet would, with no doubt in him, but just before the small piece of metal pierced though his flesh, he felt his body being pushed aside by a larger body, causing his to fall onto the hard asphalt road._

_Another 'thud' rung through Naruto's ears as his blue eyes finally reopened and saw Itachi's cold lifeless body lying beside him, his eyes cold glazed over. His breath hitch in his lungs and the tan boy forgot just how to inhale for a moment._

_Before Tobi could shoot anyone else, Gaara had gotten back up from his spot of the ground and kicked the pistol from the Akatsuki member's hand and began to beat the shit out of the elder man._

_But all of that went unnoticed by the blonde-haired boy as his blue orbs continued to gaze into the dead eyes of his friend's brother. Not only had the older man not killed him, but he also stopped Tobi from killing him as well. Naruto could not describe the feeling that began to grow inside of him, but for now he pushed all thoughts of himself out of his mind._

_For as the tan boy looked up into the terrified face of his best friend, his real question would have to be how was Sasuke going to handle his brother's death?_

--

"Naruto," the Fifth Grand Lord began as she tried relentlessly to convince the blonde that what he was doing was reckless and stupid. Though she doubted that any of her pleas were going to get through the spirit's thick head. "Try to understand. You may lose your last chance to live!" she spoke slowly so as to make sure that the blonde understood every single word she said. "Do you want that?" Sakura's emerald eyes were glued to the male spirit beside her. Her tears had all dried up now, yet her eyes still remained slightly puffy and red from her little outburst she had moments before.

"I'd rather remember my life than forget it ever happened at all." Naruto retorted with a certain glimmer of determination in his eyes.

Tsunade let out a long sigh and sat back down in her comfortable leather chair that sat behind her large wooden desk. "I'm not going to be able to convince you otherwise, am I?" she asked as she let her honey-colored eyes close and her brow purse together in frustration.

"…" Naruto continued to gaze seriously at the elder spirit, waiting for her to respond once again.

"Fine, gaki. Keep your damn memories." Tsunade said as laced her long fingers into her long blonde bangs, pushing them away from her face in the process. Naruto then let his serious expression falter as the beginnings of a grin began to make their way onto his young face.

"Arigatou." He replied with a smile.

"But just remember that if you remember anymore memories I won't be able to save you next time!" the Grand Lord shouted, trying to hide her concern for the younger spirit.

The blonde-haired boy could not keep from smiling, as he noticed the faintest hints of a blush tint the elder woman's cheeks momentarily. Knowing that Tsunade was worried for his well being just made the blonde want to smile.

"You seem perfectly fine now, so get out of my office. Don't you have something that you need to do?" As Tsunade spoke she spun her leather chair around so that the back of the chair was blocking the other three spirits' view of her body or, what she wanted to hide most of all, her face, which seemed to be becoming more flustered by the moment.

"H… Hai. Tsunade-sama." The pink-haired Shinigami finally spoke up after such a long moment of silence on her part. Naruto, with a small smirk on his lips, turned around and began to follow Shizune out of the Fifth Grand Lord's office.

"Sakura-san." Tsunade called out, not turning around to face the younger woman as she began to follow the blonde and raven out of the office. The pink-haired woman stopped in her tracks and quickly turned to face the back of Tsunade's large leather chair, as she wondered what the elder spirit could have to say to her now.

There was a short silence between them as neither one dared to speak.

"Take care of him." Tsunade finally stated, knowing that the Shinigami would know about whom she was speaking.

"Hai." Sakura nodded and then continued to exit from the Grand Lord's office and to once again meet up with the blonde-haired boy waiting for her outside. Once she heard the sound of the large metal doors that led to Shizune's own little office close, Tsunade let out a soft sigh as her eyes gazed down at the floor.

Honey orbs closed tightly as she prayed with all her might that everything would turn out fine.

--

Large wooden doors closed with a loud and audible 'clank' behind the two silent spirits as they exited from the large floating castle. Emerald eyes peered momentarily over at the blonde-haired boy beside the Shinigami as she tried desperately to see his face. Sakura kept silent as she waited for the blonde to give any sign at all that he was going acknowledge her, whom was still standing beside him, but it seemed as if Naruto was purposely ignoring the pink-haired woman.

Almost as if he was pouting.

"N-Naruto?" Sakura asked finally having built up enough courage to ask the unusually stoic blonde.

"What is it?" the tan boy snapped, making Sakura winced at the harsh tone in his usually kind and cheerfully voice. The Shinigami, without a doubt, believed that the blonde was angry with her now, if his silence and pouting weren't enough of a hint before.

"You don't have to yell at me. I was only trying to help!" Sakura retorted back to her stubborn companion.

"And you think me forgetting everything that we've learned so far would help?" Naruto finally turned his body around so that he and Sakura were facing one another. Though the pink-haired Shinigami, after seeing the furious expression that the blonde had etched onto his young face, would have liked it better had Naruto not turned to face her at all. For the first time since they had meet, she was actually… frightened of him.

"You… You might have turned into a ghost if I hadn't done anything!" Sakura's voice cracked slightly during her short statement, but she was able to mask her mishap as she narrowed her emerald orbs at the blonde spirit, hoping to intimidate him somewhat.

"What if I had just remembered something that would have helped us with remembering my death?! And then that old hag in there would have erased my memories!"

"But you've told me everything so I could have just—" Sakura's sentence was cut off short by the blonde's own infuriated shouting.

"No I haven't!!" The blonde clenched his fists tightly and brought up from his sides and swung his right fist forward. Sakura shut her eyes tightly, raising both of her arms in front of her face hoping that they would protect her from Naruto's wrath. There was a loud thud and a sickening crack that reminded Sakura of the sound of bones breaking, but the fist that Naruto had swung forward never came. The Shinigami opened her eyes slowly to see what exactly had happened and was shocked to see that Naruto had slammed his fist into the castle wall and not her young looking face.

"N-N-Naruto?" Sakura stammered.

"You once told me that you prefer not having memories of your mortal life." The blonde started to say as his gaze was solely focused on the brick-covered ground beneath their feet, while his unruly blonde bangs hung over his blue eyes. "Was that the truth?"

"…" The pink-haired woman was stunned silent; her body still shaking slightly from the shock and surprise that the blonde's actions had sparked within her. It took the Shinigami a few second for her breathing to return to normal, but eventually she was able to find her voice once more. "I-Iie. It wasn't the truth." She reluctantly said.

"Then why did you want my memories taken away?" Naruto asked, sounding as if he could cry at any given moment.

"I… I didn't." Naruto's head shot up so that he could look into the Shinigami's large emerald eyes, unable to believe what he had heard coming from her rosy red lips.

"Eh?"

"I didn't know what was going to happen to you, Naruto." Sakura started, liquid forming in the corners of her eyes. Her pale fingers wiped at the tears and then she resumed speaking to the blonde-haired spirit in front of her. "I was scared that you might completely vanish. So I brought you here, hoping that Tsunade-sama could help you, but…"

"But?" Naruto questioned in a soft yet forceful voice, urging the pink-haired Shinigami to continue on with her explanation.

"I didn't think that she was going to try to erase your memories!" Sakura blurted out as more tears began flow down her face and stain her pale cheeks, as she was unable to hold them back any longer. "When she told me that's what she was going to do, I… I… I had to try and stop her! I know how much you want to live again! Having some of those memories taken from you would just… It would just crush you!"

Sakura let her body collapse against the taller boy, her hands clutching onto the white button up shirt and her head bury into chest as if she was trying to hide her tears from the blonde boy. Naruto blushed slightly as the older woman clung to him so pitifully and instinctively wrapped his arms around her small frame awkwardly.

Loud sobs escaped from the Shinigami's mouth and Naruto realized then just how much she must regret not knowing anything of her life when she was alive. He knew now, though he still felt so horrible about Sakura's predicament, that he would never allow himself to end up like her.

Dead and without any memories of his time he spent alive.

He patted the pink-haired woman's back gently as he pulled her hands free from his shirt, easing Sakura away from him slow enough to make sure that she was fine and not going to cry anymore. Naruto gave Sakura a warm smile as she rubbed her already red and puffy eyes dry. He could tell from the slightly pink tinge to her cheeks that she was embarrassed of how emotional she had let herself become in front of the tall boy.

"Sakura." Naruto said softly as he placed his large, tan hand on her small shoulder. "Thank you. For understanding."

Though she knew it was not the time to say so, Sakura could not help but be slightly embarrassed when the blonde did not add a suffix to her name. It sounded so beautiful to the pink-haired woman's ears when Naruto said her name like that. The Shinigami merely nodded as she was still sobbing and was afraid that she dare try to speak that her tears would start up again and that was something that she did not want to have happening in front of the blonde-haired spirit again. Once was more than enough to embarrass her for the rest of eternity.

"Shall we get going then?" Naruto asked as he let his hand fall from Sakura's shoulder so that it now hung back at his side. Sakura did not protest out loud, but she could not deny to herself that she missed the warmth that the small gesture of kindness from Naruto provided for her.

Sakura nodded once again to the blonde and then took a few steps forward, so that the tan boy could now only see her back. She wiped her eyes once again; using the sleeve of her beautiful kimono, she tried to dry the remaining tears on her face as she let out a short sniffle as her arms dropped down to her sides. Emerald eyes closed as she began to concentrate on her task at hand, all whilst her arms slowly rose above her head, which made the long sleeves of her attire bundle up around her elbows.

An incantation was softly yet quickly spoken by the pink-haired spirit, making the giant rift in the sky appear once again. Once the Shinigami finished her short mantra, she turned around to face the blue-eyed boy and held out her small, pale hand toward him.

'_Naruto.'_ She thought to herself as she felt her heart fluttered from the simple touch of their hands. She could feel her face heating up once again, so she quickly took to the air, Naruto by her side, flying straight into the strange portal that would lead the two spirits to the world of the living once more.

* * *

**And so Leader-sama's grudge against Naruto and why Itachi wasn't there when Sasuke visited the Akatsuki is explained. And yeah… I'm pretty sure that Tobi died in that fight too. Or got seriously injured. I guess it doesn't really matter. That was his only role in the entire story and it's in a flashback XP.**

**I must stress this note… This story is not going to be a NaruSaku story! It's true that Sakura is developing feelings for the loveable blonde, but he belongs with Sasuke X!! Sorry he wasn't in this chapter. The next few memories that Naruto will have will make up for all the one-sided NaruSaku that I put in here.**


	11. The Sunset

**Huh… wow. Wasn't that last chapter just so full of EMOTION! Well as I've said before this story is winding down and there can only be so many new twists and turns left for our heroes. Read on to find out what will happen!!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. If I owned Naruto, everyone would be wearing awesome mask… like Ryu Hanabusa. Now there's a ninja that can kick some serious ass! ((Anyone else every played Ninja Gaiden or Dead or Alive out there?))**

**Warning: Boy Love and language. Unfortunate the only versions of this story I setup right now are "extremely not censored" shown right here and the other version, which is "extremely censored," shall be found once you click the back button.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. Cause no one else is worthy enough of this story but you XD.**

* * *

_The funeral for Uchiha Itachi was open only to immediate family members._

_Naruto had wanted to see Sasuke for quite some time after Itachi had been shot trying to save him from Tobi, but the young raven-haired boy had cooped himself up in his home ever since that unfortunate day. The youngest Uchiha did not come to school either, which worried the blonde the most since in all the time that he had been going to school along side of Sasuke he had not missed one day of class._

_As he stood outside the large Uchiha household one particular day, long after Itachi's death and funeral, the blue-eyed boy just stood silently outside staring up at the large house and the window that he knew lead to Sasuke's bedroom._

_Rain began to drizzle down from the gray sky, slowly at first, but then soon began to increase until it was now pouring. Naruto's uniform was completely soaked in a matter of minutes and the young boy did not have the courage to knock on the pale boy's door, even if it was raining heavily outside._

_Naruto let out a long sigh as his gaze dropped down onto the wet pavement beneath him, seeing his reflection being contorted and twisted by the raindrops that continued to fall onto the wet tar. Just as the blonde was about to turn his body around and walk back to his own home (though not being too happy about that because he knew that Iruka would want an explanation as why he was late), he heard the sound of a door opening and quickly let his blue eyes drift up to the spot from where the noise had come._

_Blue eyes widen in shock as he saw the familiar raven-haired boy standing in the entranceway to his large home, his usual stoic expression etched into his face. Naruto felt his breath hitch in his throat the moment that he realized at whom he was staring. The blonde's cheeks turned slightly redder than they already were from the cold breeze that continued to sting his face with nearly freezing rain._

"_Sasuke." Naruto said, his voice soft from his surprise._

"_What are you doing here?" Sasuke asked in a slightly annoyed tone. "I saw you standing out here for the last twenty minutes. Why didn't you just knock?"_

"_I…" Naruto paused as he let his gaze wander away from the pale boy in front of him. He did not have the heart to look the other boy in eyes anymore. Not when he felt so guilty for Itachi's death. "I didn't know what to say. Or if I could face you."_

"…" _Sasuke paused and Naruto did not dare look up at the raven-haired boy's expression, too worried that the Uchiha would turn him away and become angrier with him than he already was. "Get in here." Sasuke ordered not moving from the front door._

"_Eh?" Naruto asked finally looking up at his friend. He saw the raven-haired boy's cheeks were now dusted with a light pink shade and that he was struggling to kept his blush under control._

"_I said get in here."_

_Naruto wasted no time in following the other boy's orders and so quickly ran over to the front door of the Uchiha household and quickly walked into the house. He removed his shoes and jacket once he was inside the house as he watched Sasuke close his front door._

"_Wait here." Sasuke said before he disappeared off into his home, leaving the blonde to stand in front of the door, dripping water onto the tiled floor beneath him. It only took Sasuke a minute or so to return and when he did the pale boy threw a towel at the blonde. Naruto was unable to react in time to grab onto the towel, since the raven-haired boy did catch him off guard, and the piece of material landed on his head, pressing his damp locks against his already freezing flesh._

"_Arigatou." Naruto mumbled as he began to dry his hair off with the large, light blue towel._

"_Come on." Sasuke replied simply as he began to lead the blonde up to his room. Naruto was reminded of the first time that Sasuke had brought him to his home and thought that this situation was exactly like that time, except for the fact that Naruto was soaking wet this time around._

_When the two boys entered into Sasuke's bedroom Naruto did not dare to sit on anything, for he was too afraid that he would get that particular object completely wet and ruin it. He already felt guilty enough and he did not want to ruin anything else in Sasuke's life (even if it was just a piece of furniture). Naruto quietly continued to rub the light blue towel along his skin and his damp clothing, trying very hard to get himself to the point where he wasn't dripping water onto the carpet, all while Sasuke just stood in the center of the room, his body turned away from the blonde._

_Naruto knew that he would not be able to stand the silence for much longer. He had to say something or the tension would eat away at what sanity he had left._

"_I know you must hate me." Naruto said sullenly as he conveniently let the towel drape over his eyes somewhat so that he could not make eye contact with the pale boy._

"_Hate you?" Sasuke questioned, his tone was apathetic._

"_You blame me for Itachi, don't you? I know you do and… and," Naruto paused, still holding the towel over his eyes, only now he was shielding Sasuke from seeing the tears that had weld up in the corners of his blue orbs. "I'm fine with that. You should blame me. It was my fault."_

"…" _Sasuke remained quiet, which only urged Naruto to continue on with his heartfelt confession._

"_If he had just killed me then he wouldn't have had to die. He should have just let me die. I'm better off that way!" Naruto silenced himself when he realized that his soft voice had become a desperate yell somewhere in between the beginning and ending of his short speech._

_The silence from his friend did not help ease his worries either. Even if the raven was angry with him, Naruto felt that he would rather have the pale boy yelling at him, wishing him death even, rather than saying nothing._

"_I can never repair the damage that I've done, but… I'm… I'm so sorry, Sasuke." Naruto let the tears freely flow down his tan cheeks, knowing that it did not matter what he did in front of Sasuke, since he was almost completely one hundred percent positive that the Uchiha hated him now._

"_It's not your fault." Sasuke finally said, his voice soft and almost comforting._

_Blue eyes shot open and stared up at the raven-haired teenager as the light blue towel fell from the blonde's head revealing his entire face once again. "What did you say?" he asked in such a low voice that Naruto was not even sure that Sasuke had heard him._

"_I don't blame you, Naruto." Sasuke said, a small smile forming on his lips._

_The blonde could not help but cry. Hearing Sasuke say that he didn't blame him, and honestly meaning it, lifted such a burden from his shoulders that the tears just flowed freely from his eyes. To Naruto's surprise, he felt a pair of scrawny arms wrap around his back and hold him tightly against his small frame._

_Shock and surprise washed over the blonde's face as his chin was pressed into the base of Sasuke's neck. He felt the raven's hot breath dance across the flesh that his loose button up shirt left exposed along his neck, which felt good considering the blonde was still freezing and wet from being out in the rain._

"_Sa…Sasuke?" Naruto asked, so confused by the pale boy's actions._

"_I… I miss him, Naruto." Sasuke admitted as he buried his own face into the blonde's neck, not caring that his face and hair were becoming damp from the excess water that still remain soaked up in Naruto's clothing._

_The blonde knew right away that the pale boy hugging onto him could only be talking about one person… Uchiha Itachi. "It's okay to miss him." Naruto said realizing that Sasuke was really the one who was torn up the most about Itachi's death. The tan boy then let his own arms drape over the pale boy's back, slowly rubbing his long fingers along Sasuke's spine, hoping that it would soothe him slightly._

"_I missed you too." Sasuke admitted in a softer voice than he had used before. But Naruto had heard him, which only made his cheek light up with a brighter shade of red. Nevertheless the blonde-haired boy smiled._

_For all that mattered right now was that all the misunderstandings had been cleared up and that he was in Sasuke's bedroom, trying to comfort the poor boy._

--

"It's good to be back." Naruto said with a smile on his lips, as he watched the huge crowds of people still walking through the city streets. The pink-haired Shinigami momentarily wondered to herself if the people around her ever found the time to go to their homes and sleep, but she let her focus fall back to the blonde-haired boy in front of her.

"Naruto, you realize that we lost some time while we were in the spirit world. I think we should sta—" Sakura was cut off from her statement, when Naruto's curiosity got the better of him and forced him to interrupt the Shinigami in the middle of her small speech.

"How much time did we lose, Sakura-chan?" he asked. Sakura, though she knew it was not the time to admit to such things, could not help but smile when the blonde spirit used the suffix on her name once again. It was strange to her how easily she was able to become used to the familiar tone that tan boy used. She sighed and then began to speak once again, hoping that Naruto would not interrupt her for the second time that day. She was slowly becoming irritated about that little fact.

"You're not going to be happy about this Naruto, but we lost about thirty-six hours on our trip. That's why I was going to sugge—"

"_Thirty-six hours_!!" Naruto blurted out loudly, his shock completely evident on his young face. "We lost over a day!!" Sakura's wish to finally finish a sentence in the presence of the blonde-haired spirit seemed to be a far off dream with Naruto in his current state of panic. "We got to go! We have get goin—"

Sakura smiled to herself when she finally got the chance to interrupt her blonde companion. "Naruto! Calm down!" Sakura shouted. "Panicking won't help anyone! Just calmly think our next move through."

The pink-haired woman placed her small hands upon the tan boy's shoulders and forced the frantic boy to focus his view on her, hoping that some of her levelheaded nature would rub off on him by eye contact alone. "… You're right, Sakura-chan." Naruto took in a long breath and let his facial features relax into a calm expression.

"Of course I am." The Shinigami said with a proud smile. "Now, tell me what's he last thing you remember before you blacked out." Sakura released her hold on the blonde and distanced herself from the tan boy, trying to focus herself on her task at hand.

"Uh… I remember that we had followed Sasuke to the Akatsuki's hideout and then Deidara started talking about a rumble with him and my gang and then…"

Blue eyes widened to their full extent and a short gasp escaped from Naruto's lips as the blonde's sudden realization finally sunk into his mind. For a moment, the blonde's tan flesh grew pale and, without realizing it, he somehow forgot to breath. He was brought back to his senses when he felt a hand reach out and gently grab onto his shoulder, as if the hand was trying to steady the blonde-haired boy's body.

Naruto's gaze meet Sakura's and he could see the concern in her emerald orbs as the Shinigami gazed upon the shocked and confused expression on his face. "Suna…" Naruto gasped out.

"Suna?" Sakura asked as she retracted her hand from the tan boy's shoulder, now that she was convinced that he was not going to pass out or fall down.

"The name of the gang I used to belong to." Naruto explained further. "Deidara mentioned that he got into a fight with Suna. They… They knew that they wouldn't stand a chance in a fight with the Akatsuki if I wasn't with them." His eyes lit up with a spark of determination that the pink-haired spirit had not seen in the blue orbs since he had first been told of the proposition to regain his mortal life. Understanding wash over Sakura and finally she nodded her head in comprehension.

"So… what you're saying is that they may have come to you hoping to have you rejoin the group." The Shinigami replied back raising her hand to her face and placing her pale fingers against her red lips in thought.

"They may have known or seen what had happened to me if they asked me to join them on that day. They were the only ones that knew that I was going school again. So that means that they would have looked there for me, before any other place." A wide grin made its way onto the blonde's handsome face after he was done explaining the new and important led that the pair had to remembering the blonde's death. Sakura thought about the whole situation for a second and then let her gaze focus back onto the tall boy's face.

"But… Naruto. Couldn't it also be possible that they may have—" Sakura's statement was cut short when the blonde spirit grab abruptly onto the Shinigami pale, thin wrist and began pulling her further into the dark alleyways and back streets of the busy city.

"Come on, Sakura-chan!" Naruto exclaimed happily. "We just have to find Suna. I remembered where a few of their usual hang outs were, so we can check those places first!"

"N-Naruto!" Sakura protested, but her cries were unheard by the determined blonde as he continued to drag her through the eerie back roads of the city. Though she knew that she should really try harder to tell Naruto of the possible situation that she had thought up moments before, but she also knew that if were to tell the blonde of what she thought might have happened before his death that it would utterly crush the blonde. So, for the moment, the pink-haired woman kept her mouth closed and just settled to follow the blonde spirit around the outskirts of the city, searching for his former gang members.

--

Sakura was not sure exactly how long she and Naruto had been searching for Suna's hangouts, but she did know that they had been searching for almost an entire day. She remembered that the sun had risen once already and that the orange orb was now very close to setting. The sky was beginning to don a yellow tint that was slowly fading into orange as it slowly disappeared into the horizon.

The two spirit stood underneath a large bridge, that Naruto had mentioned was the very same bridge that he had seen in his memories, looking out across the river as it reflected the beautiful colors of the vast sky above them. The blonde's fists were clenched tightly together as he let his arm hang at his sides. Sakura let her body lean against the large cement pillar that helped support the large bridge, her emerald orbs carefully watching the blonde. She was afraid that the constant stream of disappointment that they had stumbled across would be getting to him and that Naruto would snap on her like he had done on the pair's last visit to the afterlife.

"…" The Shinigami could not take the blonde's serious and stoic expression any longer. "Don't worry, Naruto." The pink-haired woman suddenly spoke up as she pulled her small frame off the cement pillar. "We'll find them eventually."

She tried to put on her most convincing smile, but it was in vain. Naruto did not even look over at the Shinigami, even after she had finished speaking. Blue eyes just continued to focus on the sky above them as the sun began to slowly danced closer and closer into the horizon, the sky becoming a blood red color in the distance.

"I mean, you said it yourself. There's only so few places that they would be and we'll eventually find them." Sakura spoke up once again when her blonde-haired companion refused to acknowledge her or her statement. Sakura decided that if the tan boy was not going to listen to her, then she would just continue to speak until he was forced to pay attention.

"Two days." The blonde's voice said in a sullen tone before Sakura could continue on with her speech.

"Eh?" was the Shinigami articulate response.

"We only have two days left to remember my death." Naruto reiterated for the pink-haired spirit. "How in the world are we going to pull this off?" His voice sounded almost desperate toward the end of his short statement.

"You'll remember, Naruto." Sakura replied as she tried to encourage the blonde as much as she could.

"How can you promise something like that?!" Naruto yelled as he whipped around to finally face the pink-haired woman; his face was contorted with the rage and depression that he had tried so hard to hide as he struggled to keep himself together in front of the Shinigami. "Do you know for sure that I'll live again?"

"… I do not." Sakura replied reluctantly.

"…" Naruto had half hoped that the pink-haired spirit would have tried to make him feel better and had said that she did know that he would live again. The truth was harder for the blonde-haired boy to hear than any other lie that the Shinigami could have come up with. But it was the one thing that he did need to hear, and both Sakura and Naruto knew this.

"Naruto. Just calm down." Sakura said as she felt that it was finally safe to approach the tall boy once again and let her pale fingers reach out and laced themselves within the blonde's own long fingers.

"I can't." he admitted. "I just can't be calm. I… I'm just so tired of all of this."

"You have to be positive if you really do want to live again, Naruto." Sakura reassured the tan boy. The blonde-haired spirit then suddenly realized that the pink-haired woman's fingers had been intertwined his own and quickly pulled away from the Shinigami in his embarrassed state of mind. A slight blush made it's way onto the blonde's face as Sakura reached out her one hand toward Naruto, but then slowly retracted the appendage.

Emerald eyes looked away from the young boy's face and chose to focus on the grass-covered hill that led down toward the river, which had now took on the same red glow that the sky above gave off. She knew that she had just crossed a line with the blonde, but she, surprisingly, did not regret what she had done.

"You do want to go back to Sasuke-kun, right?" Sakura said, without any hint to her inner turmoil in her voice. "Then I suggest that you stop moping and start looking once again."

Naruto's gaze had not left from the small Shinigami frame through her entire speech. He was shocked that he had only just realized how the pink-haired woman had begun feel toward him. Guilt overtook his mind and he was forced to look away from his companion. "Arigatou, Sakura-chan." He muttered as he begun to slowly walk away from the bridge and onto the next location for them to search for the blonde's old gang members.

After another moment of silence from the pink-haired woman, she eventually turned her body to face the retreating figure of the blonde spirit and then followed only a few meters behind the tall boy.

The only thing that bothered the Shinigami now was if the blonde would ever forgive her for the feelings that she had somehow developed for the him over the past few days. Sakura hoped that somehow, some way, Naruto and herself would be able to move past this awkward moment and still be friends.

As they continued to walked toward their next destination, Sakura hoped that things would be all right, for she felt that she would simply not be able to go on if Naruto hated her for her actions.

* * *

**OMG! The flashback was angsty and then FLUFFY!! How do I mix the two of them into one flashback I will never know XD ha. Sorry that they weren't doing anything more, but they had to make up first. Or… at least see each other again.**

**I'M SORRY ABOUT NARUSAKU((That is… the one-sided NaruSaku))!! Well at least now you all know that Naruto did not take her feelings for him very well. He's loyal to his duck-butt head after all XD. I love that nickname for Sasuke. And sorry that once again he was not in this chapter. Next flash though… Oh…. You'll like it.**


	12. The Return

**I'm really sorry that I wasn't able to post up an update before I had to go on vacation. But there were some complications… meaning my aunt and her daughter came to stay at my house for a week and took my room away from me so I couldn't get to my computer to write and then I had to go on vacation and didn't have any way to get to a computer. So I'm very sorry! I'll update in the middle of the week to make up for it! Yay! Two updates this week! Oh and before I forget, this chapter isn't really proofread that much. So forgive me if there are mistakes XP.**

**I'm so tired right now. My sleeping schedule has just been in the shit hole. Because I've been sleeping in so late and then I went on vacation with people who wake up early TTTT. Or… earlier. But that's my fault since I stay up until 6 am in the morning XD ha. I hope I can get my sleep schedule back on track before I go up to college :P.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. Yet! And that's because the price of plane tickets to Japan, a burglar kit, and a ski mask add up a lot and I just don't have that kind of money right now. But one day… **

**Warning: Boy Love and language. If you have a problem you can ask the wizard—I mean author you can just suck it up because no one see the author. Not no body, not no how! :puts on fluffy green hat and funny mustache: ((Wizard of Oz rocks XD))**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. Because if it wasn't, I'd have no one else but my cat to dedicate it to XD. Seriously. You're awesome.**

* * *

_The difference in Sasuke after his brother's death had been slight and discreet chance, masked by the pale boy's usual stoic behavior. The raven had closed himself off, trying to overcome his inner turmoil. He was no more silent than usual and he was careful to act any different in front of the few people with whom he actually socialized._

_But the change was noticed._

_At least, it was noticed by the always-watchful blonde._

_Naruto had tries his hardest to stay by the raven's side at all times, worried that the young boy would retreat back into the his depressed state without him there. The blonde could only hope that his efforts did not come off as annoying to his friend, though, with the raven-hired boy's current numbness, it seemed that nothing really bothered him. It was that fact alone that made Naruto most of all. Sasuke would normally announced to Naruto and anyone within a one-kilometer radius that he was being a nuisance, for that was part of being the stoic asshole that the blonde had come to know. But, recently, he did not. Nothing bothered him. Nothing was able to stir any hints of true emotion into the raven-haired boy._

_Such apathetic nature was too much to go unnoticed._

_The two boys walked home together one day, many weeks after the elder Uchiha's funeral had come and passed. Both were silent. Sasuke was maintaining his detached routine and Naruto deep in thought, hoping to think of something, _anything_, that would pull the pale boy out of this downward spiral._

_Two pairs of feet stopped when the two of them arrived at the raven's home. Sasuke was about to walk past his friend and enter into his house, when finally Naruto was able to find his voice and speak up._

"_Hey, Sasuke!" he said a little too quickly._

"_Hn?" The raven turned his head slightly to get a better glimpse of the blonde behind him._

"_C… Can I come in?" Naruto asked, less confident than he had originally felt when the idea had popped into his brain mere moments ago._

"…" _The pale boy seemed to contemplate the notion for a few seconds, but then gave a nod to the blonde-haired boy and let Naruto follow him into the large house. The two of them removed their shoes and began to walk up toward the pale boy's bedroom, like they usually did when Naruto would come over to the Uchiha's house for a visit. Once they were both upstairs, the raven slowly opened his door and let the blonde come into the door before he began to close it once again. "Any particular reason you wanted to come over here?" Sasuke asked as his bedroom door squeaked close._

_Suddenly a pair of strong arms wrapped themselves around the raven's small waist, pulling him away from the bedroom door. Sasuke felt a strong and defined chest being pushed against his back whilst the pair of arms tightened they gripped around his stomach. An intense blush crept its way onto the raven's cheeks and a short gasp escape from his thin lips as he fell into the body behind him._

_Still blushing fiercely, Sasuke turned his around to come face to face with his best friend, holding him tightly and letting his mess of blonde hair lay against the base of the raven's neck. The short, unruly locks of hair tickled Sasuke neck as Naruto head nuzzled further into the pale boy's shoulder. Naruto would have been happy to have finally seen the stoic expression disappear from the raven's face, but the blonde dare not lift his head up in fear that his friend would only push him away. His muscles tensed unintentionally, preparing himself for the rejection that he prayed would never come._

_The two boys stood there silently for a moment or two, both afraid to speak or too embarrassed by the awkwardness of the sudden embraced._

"_Naruto? What the hell?" Sasuke spoke out barely above a whisper, trying his best to keep his embarrassment and anger down to a manageable level. His tone showed his obvious irritation and his hands started to clench into fists, for the raven was unsure if he should start to pry the blonde-haired teenager from his back. "Get off me. This is embarrassing."_

"_Be embarrassed." Naruto replied, his voice slightly muffled because of Sasuke's shoulder. "Be angry. Be happy. Even be sad! Just… stop holding back your emotions." Naruto continued, his body slightly shaking as hushed sobs began to seep from his mouth._

"…" _Sasuke dark orbs widened when the blonde's words finally registered in his mind. His arms relaxed and he let them hang lifelessly at his sides. Unconsciously his body leaned back into Naruto's chest, deepening their hug. "Naruto." He finally whispered breathlessly._

_Blue orbs rose up to meet the shocked gaze of the raven-haired boy. They shared a short moment of silence between one another, neither daring to speak a word or risk ruining the moment and breaking the weird tension in the air. Then suddenly, Naruto spoke up once again; his eyes were dead focused on Sasuke's dark orbs, as they continued to get wider and his cheeks continued to grow redder. "I prefer the Sasuke who didn't bottle everything up inside." The blonde paused and then added one more thing onto his previous statement. "Or, who at least let a few emotions slip by."_

_The pale boy, still wrapped up in Naruto's grasp, found himself trapped within the awkward embrace, which forced him to crane his neck in a very uncomfortable position in order to even look at the blonde-haired teenager. Sasuke was absolutely stunned into silence by the words that the tan boy had spoken to him. His true feeling having finally been forced out into the open like that had utterly shocked the Uchiha and sent him into a stupor state._

"… _I fell in love with that Sasuke."_

_Silence. It was the only thing that the both the raven and the blonde were able to come up with after Naruto had so frankly uttered how he felt about the pale boy in his arms. The awkward tension and quiet had gone on for so long that Naruto was afraid that neither of them would ever be able to speak again._

"_I… Forgive me." Naruto said quickly as his arms grew limp and began to release their hold on the raven-haired teenager's small frame. Both arms fell to his sides and then Naruto immediately let his head hang down far enough for his unruly blonde bangs to cover his tear-filled eyes. "I shouldn't have said that."_

_The blonde, unable to think of any other way out of the horrible situation, pushed past the boy in front of him and began to head for Sasuke's bedroom door. But Naruto was stopped before he could even get two steps away from the pale boy before he was jerked backwards suddenly as he felt something tug at his loose button-up shirt, causing him to stumble over his own feet._

_As Naruto's body began to tumble closer to the ground, the blonde quickly turned his body around in order to shield most of his body from the fall. As soon as Naruto turned around, he found himself, instead on hurdling toward the floor beneath him, being pulled by gravity into the Sasuke's scrawny arms. The force of Naruto's body make Sasuke stumbled slightly, but the raven quickly regained his balance and brought both himself and the clumsy blonde-haired boy to their knees._

_Thus the two boys found themselves in yet another awkward embraced. Both stared at each other: Naruto in shock and embarrassment and Sasuke wore an expression of sheer determination with an added touch of pink to his usually pale cheeks._

"_G-Go… G-G-Go…" Naruto mumbled. The blonde continued to try to force words out of his mouth, but only continued to fail miserably to even form a coherent sentence in his flustered state._

_Sasuke had enough of Naruto never-ending muttering. The Uchiha rolled his dark eyes and then leaned his face in closer to the tan boy quickly. Before the blonde even knew what in the world had happened, since he was still currently trying to form words instead of syllables, Sasuke's lips crashed onto Naruto's to form a very sloppy kiss. Though it had successfully stopped the blonde teenager from continuing to idiotically stutter out an apology._

_A pair of dark eyes closed, as an attempt urge the other participant in the kiss to react, and then pushed his thin lips harder onto Naruto's dry lips. Said blonde was in a state of shock from the sudden action. His blue eyes permanently shot open as wide as they would go and his cheeks a bright scarlet color. In his shocked state, Naruto tried desperately to process what had happening and what was currently happening to him. He remembered falling and then Sasuke caught him. He wondered how the two of them had gone from almost toppling one another over to sharing a messy first kiss._

_His shock eased down and Naruto's blue eyes grew heavy and ultimately closed, enjoying the feeling of Sasuke's lips pressed against his own._

_Finally reacting properly to the kiss, Naruto repositioned his head and let his tongue slip across the raven's lower lip, asking for permission to deepen the impromptu kiss. Without realizing fully that he had done so, Sasuke let his lips open slightly, which gave the blonde all the permission he needed to stick his tongue inside the pale boy's mouth._

_The two separated for a chance to let their lungs fill back up with desperately needed air. Naruto let his forehead rest against the raven's slender shoulder and there he stayed until he was able to catch his breath. Their ragging breath slowly calm and the blonde finally built up the courage to meet the pale boy's gaze once more. To his surprise, the raven seemed to have enjoyed their kiss almost as much as he had himself for Sasuke let his dark orb remain closed and he wore an expression that made him seem like he was forcing his facial features not to give away the sheer amount of pleasure he felt. The Uchiha let his dark eyes open half way so that he could look upon the waiting blonde for a moment._

"_That… That was…" Naruto fumbled for the right words for only a moment before meeting the raven-haired teenager's gaze. "Do… Do that again." He practically breathed out._

_Sasuke was never one who had to be told anything twice and without a moment's delay, launched his slightly swollen lips back onto the blonde's. And that was how the two boys stayed for most of what was left of the night._

--

"WHY HAVEN'T WE FOUND THEM YET?!"

A tan fist collided with the brick wall of the nearest building, but yet, no sound could be heard as the appendage made contact with the hard surface. For the fist did not have any true physical form to crash upon said brick wall.

Sakura sighed, unable to find a suitable way to ease the blonde and his rage, which only seemed to grow as their search continued on. She wondered if there really was anything she was capable of doing to calm her companion, or if his rage was unstoppable. Sakura mused to herself momentarily how maybe it would a good thing, at least for the time being. That Naruto was still a spirit and did not have a physical form.

Otherwise he would have probably hurt someone, himself or public property by now.

"We're running out of time!" Naruto shouted once again, his angry very apparent on his handsome face. "You'd said we find them!" The blonde turning on his heels so that he could look straightforward at the pink-haired Shinigami.

"How is this my fault?" Sakura asked, offended that Naruto would even be able to convince himself that somehow she was the reason behind the failure to find his old gang members. The Shinigami bent her torso forward as she placed her one pale hand onto her slim waist, scowling at the blonde and his ridiculous accusation. "I don't even know what these people look like."

"I KNOW!!" Naruto yelled tangling his hands into his wild mess of hair in frustration. He turned away from Sakura, for the pink-haired girl had visibly gasped and slightly cowered at the intense rage that Naruto had displayed, and took a long calming breath to settle his nerves. Feeling that he was finally calm enough to face the Shinigami without snapping once again, the blonde turned his body around to face the pink-haired spirit once again. "It's just… We only have one more day to remember my death. _One more day_!"

"But there's still time." Sakura said reluctantly.

"How am I supposed to remember dying with only twenty-four hours left?" Naruto let out a small chuckle, feeling utterly hopeless about the entire situation. His fingers brushed back his spiky blonde locks and rested on the top of his head. It was surprisingly hard to grasp the concept of failing this mission that he had been assigned. Naruto had always thought that remembering a simple memory would be easy enough of a challenge, but now he truly saw how hard this small task was.

Sakura, unable to answer her blonde companion's question, let her gaze drift down to stare at her sandals as they scrapped nervously across the tough cement beneath them. Her finger subconsciously began to play with the short strands of pink bangs that hung on each side of her pale face as she tried to think of something encouraging to say to the spirit in front of her.

Naruto let out a sigh. "See. Even you don't know if I'm going to be able to do this."

The Shinigami did not raise her gaze as the blonde boy spoke to her. She was too ashamed of the fact that she actually did not know if the blonde would be able to pull off this seemingly impossible task and she was unable to provide any wisdom or guidance.

Suddenly Naruto walked passed the pink-haired woman, not giving her a second glance nor did he say anything to her as he walked on. Green eyes quickly moved from the ground beneath her feet to glance up at the retreating figure of the blonde.

"Where are you going?" she practically gasped out.

"Nowhere." Naruto said, his tone angry and annoyed most likely due to the fact that his case seemed hopeless, and continued to walk away from the young-looking woman.

Sakura had no idea what had come over her, but she suddenly felt as if her body have developed a mind of its own and began to move against her conscious will. Her pale hand reached out and just barely managed to grab unto the back of tan boy's loose button up shirt, stopping Naruto from freely walking any further away from the Shinigami than he already had. Now very pissed off, Naruto turned his body around severely, causing Sakura to release her grip that she had on his shirt, and gave the pink-haired Shinigami a cold stare.

"Let go!" Naruto practically roared at the other spirit.

"Then stop running away!" Sakura frantically cried back to the blonde as she tried to give him an equal intimidating glare. Though it did not seem to have any effect on the enraged blonde.

"I'm not running away." Naruto snapped, ready to turn back around and leave the pinkhaired spirit like he had originally tired to do before she stopped him.

"Yes you are!" Sakura retorted. "You're giving up on remembering your death because you think that you can't do it and that it's a hopeless cause."

"It is a hopeless cause."

"No it's not!" Sakura stomped her delicate foot down upon the hard concrete beneath her foot in her frustration and glared at the blonde with such fury in her emerald eyes. Realizing how riled up Naruto had made her, she took in a deep long breath and pushed her long pink bangs away from her pretty face. She let her eyes close and they reminded that way for a good minute or two before she was finally able to regain her calm composure that she tired so hard to keep. "Naruto, I know you can do this. Maybe we've been focusing on the wrong things. Maybe our lead will take us to another dead end. But we can't give up."

"Why? What difference does it make whether I live or die?" Naruto asked, really feeling the effect of all the recent failures to remember the one memory that will let him live again.

"It will certainly make a difference to Sasuke-kun." Sakura said, her voice steady though she was secretly hiding her fear of what the blonde would do or say when the raven's name was brought up after they had not mentioned nor seen said boy for what seemed like an eternity.

"… Sasuke?" Naruto whispered to himself, snapping out of his depressed state.

"Yeah, think that he would like it very much if you just didn't wake up from the c--" The Shinigami was cut off from finishing her sentence as he quickly turned his body around and began to run in the same direction that he had started off in before Sakura had stopped him before. The pink-haired girl stared at Naruto's shrinking figure until the fact that he had run away from her again finally processed in her mind. "Hey… Naruto! Where are you going?!" She yelled out, now trying to catch up to the blonde spirit.

"To find Sasuke!" the tan boy called back.

"Eh? Why?"

"I just have to see him!"

"…" Sakura was completely lost as to how the change in Naruto had so quickly come over the blonde-haired spirit. The Shinigami let out a frustrated sigh, just happy that Naruto was no longer in his depressed state, and began to follow the blonde-haired boy to an unknown destination.

--

By the time that the blonde had finally stopped, Sakura was only a few small strides behind him. Naruto glanced back at the pink-haired woman as she slowly walked over to where the blonde had stopped. The Shinigami placed her pale hands on her knees, as if to catch her breath for a moment, and then let her gaze wander up to meet Naruto's.

"Wh… Why did you… run off like that?" Sakura asked. Before her companion was able to give her any form of reply Sakura's green orbs wandered up above the blonde boy's head and noticed the large sign on the building behind him, signifying that Naruto had lead her back to the hospital. Confused, Sakura let her emerald eyes focus back onto the tan boy's face, searching for an answer as to why they had come back to the place where his unconscious physical body lay. However, the answers that Sakura sought never came, for the blonde leaped into the air and disappeared into the walls of the building.

Irritated with the blonde's recent rambunctious behavior, the Shinigami let out a low growl deep in throat and continued to follow her annoying companion. Once the pink-haired woman passed through the brick wall, she paused in her movements and stared at the tall blonde as he loomed over his body. Slowly she walked over toward the boy in front of her so that she could stand by his side inside of starring at his back (which she felt that she had been doing a lot of recently).

"Uh… Naruto?" the pink-haired Shinigami spoke up reluctantly as she let herself glance over at the blonde from the corner of her green eyes. His serious expression slightly startled the Shinigami and caused her to let her gaze wander over to Naruto's unconscious form laying on the uncomfortable hospital bed.

The blonde gave no response nor any sign that he had even heard the pink-haired woman speak. She would have grumbled under her breath about inattentive the blonde spirit was, but his serious stopped her from doing anything that might make his mood worse.

"Uh… Don't mind me asking, but… Um… Why did you come back… here?" The Shinigami did not dare to look back at her blonde companion in fear that he would snap at her.

"I thought… he might come back here to visit me." Naruto paused. "I guess I was wrong."

Sakura felt horrible as she saw how much the blonde was hurt by the fact that he was not even able to find his former lover. She knew that all this searching and coming up with nothing was definitely getting to him. Though she knew that no matter what she said to the tall boy beside her, he would never truly let the words sink in. The Shinigami reached out her hand as if she were going to set her hand on the blonde's shoulder in a comforting manner, when she sudden stopped what she was doing and retracted her hand slowly. Sakura had remembered how the blonde had taken to her showing her true feelings for him. She figured that Naruto could very much do without the added guilt of not returning the pink-haired woman's feelings and did not want him to have to feel even worse than he already did.

"Sakura-chan?" The blonde asked, but did not wait for a reply from the other spirit. "Would you mind if we stayed here for a while?"

She paused. Sakura knew that they really should be out in the city, looking for clues and finding new leads, but then she also knew that the blonde deserve some time alone and maybe this time would let him get over his depression and recharge his drive to remember his death.

The Shinigami let out a small smile and turned her body slightly to face the blonde-haired boy a little better. She decided to take a risk and let her pale hand rest on Naruto's broad shoulder, hoping that he would realized that the pink-haired spirit was in fact worried about him.

"Of course we can stay." she said with that small smile still in place on her red lips.

Her pale hand then dropped back down to her side and the Shinigami, respecting Naruto space and feelings, step over so that she was now on the other side of the room. It was the most privacy that she could offer the blonde whilst still keeping an eye on him to make sure he did not run away like he had tried to do before. Sakura let her gaze peer outside the large window on the adjacent wall and she let out a sigh as dark, dismal clouds began to make their way closer and closer toward the sun. Almost as if the weather was mimicking the blonde spirit's mood, the dark and depressing clouds threatening to cover and engulf the bright, yellow sun and in the process block out the light that radiated from it. It gave the Shinigami an uneasy feeling.

She gave the blonde one last glance before she completely turned her body around, to let him be in peace for the time being.

* * *

**It was weird. For this chapter, I was constantly switching back and forth from writing the flashback to writing the main plot. I couldn't keep myself focused on either one of them for more than ten minutes at a time. I guess I've really have had **_**some**_** week to screw me up this badly XD.**

**Oh and BTW. I bought **_**Breaking Dawn **_**at midnight on August 1st ((er… technically August 2nd)). Haven't read it yet. Don't read that fast and I haven't had time. Don't spoil it for me!!**


	13. The Leader

**I've decided to go back to updating this story every other week. It's not cause I want to. It's because school started up and now I'm in college and I'll be lucky to find enough time to write a chapter in two weeks. I think I'll be fine though. I have no social life DX :sadness:.**

**This is the first chapter of this story that I have written **_**solely**_** on my new laptop. I love this thing. I haven't been away from it for more than an hour… Except when I sleep. And even then it's sitting right next to my bed. I'm a little… obsessed XD ha, ha.**

**Disclaimer: I do own Naruto. If I did then there would have been a lot more sexual tension between Sasuke and Naruto in part one and then they would have become a canon couple in part two. And the main focus would not be ninjas… per se. It would have been… a more… adult… topic…**

**Warning: Boy Love and language. Because I'm an adult and that means that I can do what I want and I can be held responsible for what I do as well. Except if you don't want to read about that sort of stuff, this warning makes me NOT responsible for possible scarring that may occur. So nyaah :P.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. You're cool, you're awesome, you're hip, you're groovy, you're super keen, you're swell, you're… :pause: I ran out of adjectives.**

* * *

"_YOU WHAT?!" Temari screeched as she gave the blonde-haired boy in front of her a look of disbelief._

"_What do you mean you want to leave the gang?" Kankuro asked as he took a step closer to the shorter boy, clenching his fists together and gritted his teeth together in his anger._

"_Just that. I want out." Naruto replied not meeting the two siblings' glares and instead choosing to let his eyes gaze at their chins instead. He did not want to exactly look his fellow gang members in their eyes, but looking down at the ground would only make them think of him as a coward, which was not something Naruto wanted the three siblings to think._

"_Like hell you're leaving that easily!" Temari almost growled as punched the tan boy in his cheek, enjoying the loud thud that she heard as her knuckles connected with the shorter boy's jaw. Naruto stumbled back a few steps and looked up in time to see that Kankuro was already charging at him ready to hit him as well. Naruto took a defensive pose, but remembered that if he were to fight back he would more than likely end up worse than if he did nothing._

_And so the blonde let his arms fall back down to his sides lifelessly and motionlessly waited the beating from the three siblings._

_The brunette's fist collided with the blonde toned stomach, knocking the wind out of him, and as _

_Naruto was lowering his body toward the ground Kankuro punched the blonde in the nose and forced him to fall to the ground faster._

_Temari got in one last kick to his back before the beating that the both she and Kankuro were given the younger boy was interrupted by the third and youngest sibling._

"_Stop." Gaara said I his usual stoic and quiet voice. "Enough of this."_

"_But—!" Kankuro started to say, but then decided to rephrase his previous sentence. "We aren't just going to let him leave are we."_

"_Yes we are." Gaara replied as his green eyes looking straight ahead at his older brother, never blinking as he spoke._

"_Exactly, we kick his a—" Temari stopped herself short when she realize exactly what her youngest brother had said. The blonde-haired girl looked up at the quiet redhead and looked into his narrowed eyes, searching to see if the shortest of the group truly meant what he had said. She had seen no sign of Gaara being anything but deathly serious in his dark rimmed green eyes_

_Naruto wiped the trail of blood coming from his mouth away with the back of his hand and stared wide-eyed up at the stoic redhead, amazed that he was being allowed to leave the gang with only a few scrapes and bruises. Blue eyes looked up at Gaara's face, begging for an explanation, but knew that his long time friend would never explain his odd actions._

_Slowly, the blonde-haired boy rose to his feet and took a few steps away from the three siblings instinctively, fearing that they would still hit him, despite what Gaara had said. His eyes narrowed, not trusting the whole situation. It was unheard of that gang members got out of leaving their gangs without being beaten within an inch of their lives or even killed. So why had Gaara stopped his older siblings from beaten the shit out of him? Naruto almost did not want to find out the redhead's reason._

"_Go." Said redhead's voice was soft, yet held a threatening tone to it._

"_Wha… what?" Naruto stuttered out, finding it hard to force the words out of his surprisingly dry throat._

"_Leave here. Now!" The volume of Gaara's voice rose up several notches and the cruel and threatening edge to his voice increased tenfold as well._

_The blonde obeyed the redhead's frightening request and ran as fast as his legs could carry him toward a place where he would feel safe from the three siblings' wrath, if Gaara were to ever change his mind about his beating._

"_Be right there." Sasuke yelled out as the doorbell rang loudly through the mostly empty house and the raven-haired teenager ran quickly to the door, so that he was not to keep the person on the other side waiting for very long. Sasuke opened the door and gasped when he saw the familiar blonde leaning against his doorway, his body covered in dried blood with small cuts and bruises on his exposed flesh. Sasuke could only imagine what had happened the blonde-haired boy to get him into _

_such a state._

_Sasuke stared at the tattered blonde, his dark eyes wide with shock and worry. He stood there frozen by his distressed state just simply letting his dark eyes wander over the blonde's body, taking in the horrid state that he was in._

"_N-Naruto." Sasuke stuttered. "What happened to you?"_

"_It's nothing bad." He lied as he gave the pale boy a small, forced smile, lifting his head up slightly so that he could look upon the raven's face. "Can I come in?"_

_The raven stepped aside to let the tan boy into his home, still partly numb and shocked by the sight of Naruto so beaten and at his door. "S-Sure." He said once Naruto was practically at the base of the stairs. Sasuke shut his front door and quickly ran over to the blonde side to help him if need be. He lifted Naruto's left arm and draped it over his shoulders so that he could support the other boy as the climb the stairs._

_Once the two of them were inside Sasuke's bedroom, the raven-haired boy set Naruto down gently on his bed and without wasting a second ran out of his room and into the bathroom across the hall and came back holding a First Aid kit in his hand and a damp wash cloth in the other. The pale boy sat beside Naruto on his bed and places his hand gently against his chin so that he could turn the blonde's face toward himself. Taking a moment to stare into the boy's beautiful blue eyes, he reminded himself to focus and began to softly press the wash cloth to Naruto's face, washing away the dried blood._

"… _You never answered my question." Sasuke said, not looking into Naruto's eyes. He could not take the blank expression that the blonde wore._

"_Eh? You're question?" Naruto asked. Sasuke smiled a little when he heard some of the old Naruto's voice sneak back into the blonde's voice. His expression even resembled his old confused, yet still cheerful (since he was always cheerful around the raven) look that he would always give him._

"_What happened to you?" Sasuke asked again._

"_Oh." Was Naruto articulate response. The raven paused in his actions and looked at the blonde's face, waiting for the boy beside him to give him a response. "I left my gang."_

_The wash cloth in Sasuke's hand dropped down onto the carpeted floor._

_His dark eyes widened as he looked at the blonde-haired teenager's face in awe. His hand still hovered in front of the blonde's face, while his other hand was still resting gently against Naruto's chin, keeping the blonde's face toward him. For the second time that night, the Uchiha had been stunned into silence._

"_You… left you're gang?" Sasuke eventually spit out. It had been meant to be a statement, but Sasuke's unsure and soft tone had transformed it into a question. "I… I don't understand. Why did you do that?"_

_Naruto paused and gave the pale boy a warm smile. The first real smile that the raven had seen him sport all day."I know how angry you were at Itachi for always putting himself in danger by being in a gang." Sasuke stiffened at the mention of his elder brother's name, but gave the tan boy a look that urged him to continue on with his explanation. "It eventually cost him his life. I don't want to put you through all that pain again, Sasuke."_

_A tan hand then wrapped its long fingers into Sasuke's spiky locks, messaging the pale boy's scale slightly as he played with the short strands of hair. The action caused the raven to be pulled from his shocked state and let his dark eyes close at the pleasurable feeling. He felt his head being gently pulled forward and let his eyes open half way, letting him meet Naruto's own half-lidded eyes._

_Before their lips could meet in the upcoming kiss, Sasuke placed his pale fingers against the blonde's mouth, to pause him in his actions for a moment. Naruto's eyes opened all the way as his confusion and curiosity took over his mind. He was about to protest when Sasuke finally spoke up._

"_You didn't have to…" Sasuke trailed off._

"_I know." Naruto knew what the raven was talking about, so it was pointless for the pale boy to further explain what he was trying to say. "But I wanted to." He pushed his lips closer to the Uchiha's face once again, but instead of being physically stopped by Sasuke's finger, which had now dropped from his mouth to rest along his shoulder, Naruto was stopped by what Sasuke said next._

"_I love you."_

_His voice had been no higher than a whisper, but for Naruto, it felt as if he had shouted it. Those words that he had always wished that he would hear from the raven-haired boy. The feelings that he had hoped for so long would be returned by Sasuke. Finally, everything that Naruto could have ever wanted in life was his. And his alone._

_Naruto's lips crashed against the pale boy's thin lips, desperate to prove that this was not a dream or an illusion caused from an injury to his head (given to him from Temari, Kankuro or Gaara). He clung to the loose fabric along the raven's body, pulling him closer, which only made Sasuke wrap his arms around the blonde's neck, also craving the close contact from the other._

_When the two of them separated for air, they let their foreheads lean against the other's as they let their half-lidded eyes, filled with passion and need, stare at the other. They stayed like that for a moment, admiring each other's expressions and taking in each and every feature on the other's face._

_Their lips the met yet again and both boys knew exactly where the night would take them._

--

A few moments of quiet reflecting had turned into hours. Sakura had not had the heart to speak to the blonde-haired spirit, let alone convince him that he had spent enough time standing around the hospital room, staring at his unconscious body. Even though Naruto had only admitted to want to have a short moment to himself, the Shinigami knew that he was secretly waiting to see if Sasuke 

would come.

Even Sakura had hoped after the first few minutes that the raven-haired boy would come walking through those doors and say something that would fuel a new found determination in the blonde. But Sasuke had yet to come, and the Shinigami feared that the two of them would soon waste all of their valuable time left waiting in the brightly lit hospital room.

She let out a soft sigh and placed a small, elegant hand upon his shoulder, giving it a quick squeeze as she tried her best to comfort and reassure the blonde-haired boy. "Naruto…" she started to say, her voice was soft and barely above a whisper. "We should probabl--" The pink-haired spirit was cut short when the only door leading out to the drab hospital hallways slowly creaked open until it was just barely able to let a single person inside. Subconsciously, both Sakura and Naruto held their breaths as their heads turned suddenly to catch a glimpse of the person entering into the peaceful hospital room.

And Naruto heart almost stopped when said mysterious person finally came into view.

A familiar head of raven hair peeked around the door and saw that the room was empty, except for the unconscious body lying motionless in the stiff and uncomfortable looking hospital bed. He silently closed the door and walked over to the lone chair sitting beside the blonde's bed, as if it was waiting for someone to come and watch over the boy in the coma.

Both of the invisible spirit moved out of the pale boy's way as he silently glided over to the chair and took his usual seat beside his blonde and let his fingers ghost over the tan boy's palm before he finally took Naruto's hand in his own. There was a short moment of silence before the raven finally took his gaze away from the blonde-haired boy's hand, still tight in his grasp, so that he could now look upon Naruto's peacefully face.

His lips pursed together as if he was deciding on whether or not say something. Though Naruto thought that it was silly of the pale boy to d such a thing considering the blonde could not hear him (at least his physical body could not hear him) even if he did speak.

"Your friends are hard to find, you know that." Sasuke practically whispered, giving the blonde's lifeless hand a gentle squeeze.

At these words, both Sakura and Naruto began to listen intently to what the raven-haired boy was going to say. The two spirits gathered around the Uchiha, hanging on his every word in hopes that it will be helpful to them in some way.

"…" Sasuke paused again, obviously too distressed to see the unconscious blonde so motionless and void of life. His gaze faltered for a moment from the tan boy's handsome face, but his dark eyes only drifted from their focus point for a moment. "I've looked everywhere for those three. Gaara and his siblings. I wonder if they're hiding because they really are…" Sasuke looked Naruto up and down his body as he paused, trying to force out the words. "Responsible for this."

Naruto took a large stepped toward the boy sitting in the chair and reached out his hand to grab onto the boy's shoulder, only to be reminded that such an action was impossible as his tan fingers glided 

smoothly through the raven's shoulder and part of the chair in which he was sitting. He winced as he brought his hand closer to his face, half glaring at the traitorous appendage for not even being able to comfort Sasuke as he sat there, no more than a few centimeters from himself. The pink-haired Shinigami saw the anguish cross the blonde's face and wished that there was a way to console both him and the raven beside him.

"I asked Deidara if he had ever seen them after their threat." Sasuke spoke once again after another pause. Naruto believed that he was simply talking to keep himself from breaking down. Again the blonde thought it was silly of the raven to be afraid of doing such things when the only other person in the room was in a coma. If he did not feel like crying himself, he would laugh at how his Uchiha pride refused to let him show his true emotions, even while he was alone.

"I bet they went into hiding to avoided suspicion." Sakura stated as her emerald eyes narrowing in her anger and her thin, pale arms crossing over her chest, ruffling the long decorative sleeves of her kimono.

"I… I just can't believe that they would try to _kill_ me." Naruto said not letting his gaze drift from Sasuke for even a moment. The raven, feeling his mask begin to crack, grabbed onto Naruto's limp hand tightly, covering the tan appendage with his other hand now and let his forehead rest against them. The blonde-haired spirit bit his lip as he watched helplessly as the pale boy began to crumble before his eyes.

"Well they're delinquents after all." Sakura scoffed. "I wouldn't put it against them to still hold a grudge against you for leaving the gang. Maybe they even threatened you to join them again for the fight with the Akatsuki."

The blonde just could not wrap his mind around the thought of Gaara, Kankuro or Temari trying to kill him because they still were angry about him leaving their gang. Sure he knew that Temari and Kankuro were furious when he left, but the two of them would never kill him. He knew that for a fact. After all, those three were his oldest and closest friends. Would leaving the gang really mean that they would rather have him dead than not a member? He hoped that Sakura's accusations were wrong.

"I think Pain is scared of your old gang now." Sasuke let out a forced chuckle, hoping it would actually make him feel slightly better though he knew nothing could make he feel better while Naruto was still in a coma. "He yelled at Deidara and me when I was there. Told us to stop looking for them. And that they would only bring trouble."

"Even Sasuke-kun thinks that they're up to no good." Sakura said trying to prove to the blonde her point. "Come on, Naruto. The sooner that you accept that they tried to kill you, the sooner you'll remember your death." Her arms unfolded as she spoke and she placed her small, pale hands upon her slim hips, turning her body to face the blonde spirit beside her. When it was obvious that her companion was not really listening to her, the Shinigami sighed and then continued on with her one-sided conversation. "It's like the leader of the Akatsuki said. They bring trouble."

Bright, blue eyes widened as much as they possible could after his mind slowly let what Sakura had said sink in completely. He faced away from Sasuke for the first time since the raven had entered the 

hospital room, and turned quickly toward the pink-haired woman, grabbing onto her shoulders tightly. Sakura winced at the tight grip on her shoulders, but was more concerned with the reason behind the blonde-haired boy's sudden assault on her. "Sakura-chan! What did you just say?" he asked, slightly shaking the spirit as he spoke.

"…" The pink-haired Shinigami gave her companion a confused glance, but then complied with his demand reluctantly. "I just said that I agreed with the Akatsuki leader." Her voice was soft as if she was afraid that he has crossed the line and said something that she should not have said.

"Not that. What did he say?"

"… That they bring trouble?" Sakura's voice lifted upward and made her statement becoming a question with her unsure tone.

"But that's not what Sasuke said." Naruto face was suddenly lit up with what Sakura believed to be excitement. The Shinigami's confusion did not waver even after the blonde spirit had relinquished his grip on the pink-haired woman's shoulders. Sakura rubbed her sore shoulder lightly with her pale hand and continued to stare at the tan boy as he turned his back on her and faced the raven-haired teenager, whom was still sitting in the chair beside the hospital bed.

"What are you getting at, Naruto?" The spirit's voice was obviously annoyed and irate, but Sakura did nothing to hide that fact from Naruto.

"Pain, according to Sasuke, had said that Sand _would_ bring trouble if anyone tried to find them." Naruto paced around Sasuke's chair, glancing at the pale boy every now and again, just to check in case he was going to say anything else that may be useful. "Meaning that if they were found, something would happen."

"That actually makes sense, but," Sakura said, half stunned that everything the blonde was saying had some solid proof behind it, but also still not completely sure in which direction his train of thought was heading toward. "Sasuke-kun also said that the Akatsuki leader may just be afraid of your old gang. Isn't that also a possibility."

Naruto just shook his head, his wild, blonde locks swaying gently as his head moved back and forth, and moved his gaze from Sasuke to the confused Shinigami. "Even if Sand was able to take me out, Pain would never be afraid of them."

"And why not?" Sakura felt slightly offended that it was impossible for her scenario to be correct. Her hands found their way back to her small waist and she pushed her chest forward so that her torso was now leaning toward the blonde.

"If there's one thing that Akatsuki have, it's numbers." Naruto answered back bluntly. "It would have been the nine of them to three. And as good as they are, they would never stand a chance."

Sakura's emerald eyes wide as soon as she heard the blonde words. Her red lips parted slightly as she brought her pale hand up to cover her gapping mouth, stunned by the sudden realization that Naruto had forced upon her. "He'd have no reason to be afraid of them." The Shinigami said slowly, 

her voice was soft as she turned her gaze to look upon Naruto's unconscious body, which still lay upon the uncomfortable hospital bed. "And… judging on what he said to Sasuke when we followed him to the Akatsuki hideout, he would have been all too happy to have you taken out."

"Exactly."

Words failed the Shinigami. She quickly whipped her head around to look wide-eyed at the blonde-haired spirit, desperately looking for confirmation to her thoughts. Naruto nodded gravely and both spirits finally knew what exactly had happen to the blonde boy on that fateful day almost an entire week ago.

But something was still off.

"Naruto?" Sakura asked, noticing the blonde's odd expression.

"Sakura-chan," Naruto started to say, his blue eyes narrowed and his lips set into a frown. "Even though we know what happened, I…" he paused and let his blue eyes wander over to Sasuke's slumped form in the chair, unable to keep eye contact with the pink-haired woman in front of him.

"What is it, Naruto?" The Shinigami asked, beginning to get impatient with the tan boy in front of her. She watched him starring at Sasuke, possibly looking for some form of support from the raven-haired teenager, yet unable to obtain it in his current state. A low sigh escaped from Naruto lips before the blonde turned his head back to face the worried pink-haired spirit, his once bright blue eyes cast in a shadow from his blonde bangs and full of pain of such anxiety.

"I still can't remember my death."

* * *

**Oh my! Naruto and Sasuke :giggle:. Okay, I want to say that I would have totally and honestly written a lemon for this chapter but there was two things. One: the rating. I'm not increasing it just to put in some smut. And two: the chapter was already long enough. But it was mostly reason one.**

**And yet Naruto is still not remembering. Don't hurt me D:. I mean, he still has like half a day to remember. Loads of time :pauses: … :goes to hide in the corner:**


	14. The Bullet

**You know you're addicting to something when you begin to quote fictional characters. I was texting my friend today and I said "Sure, sure." And if you don't know which character says that, then the obsessed fan part of my being hates you XD ha. I kid. It's Jacob Black from the Twilight Saga if you didn't already know.**

**Oh and the memory in this chapter won't be at the beginning. Cause I felt like it :P. And it makes more sense. You'll find out.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. But I've been practicing up on my court skills ((by playing Phoenix Wright games)) and I think I'm ready to take Kishimoto-sensei to court for custody. **

**Warning: Boy Love and language. 'Cause cussing and watching boys make-out makes me feel better after a long and tired day of going to classes and dealing with life. So I'm gonna put it in here XD.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. Cause nothing says "I think you awesome" like a whole story filled with hotties like Naruto and Sasuke.**

* * *

"W-What did you say?" Sakura stuttered out as her emerald eyes gazed upon Naruto's frantic face. She wished that she had just heard the blonde incorrectly. Could he really still not remember his death? They had just figured everything out. It was as clear as black and white, night and day. And yet… Why did the memory not come to the tan boy's mind?

"This can't be happening!" Naruto practically shouted as he walked through Sasuke's sitting form and past Sakura as she simple moved backwards slightly to get out of his way as she still stared off with a shocked expression. The spirits were so consumed by the blonde's problem that they did not even realize that Sasuke let out an involuntary shiver after Naruto passed through his body as he stormed off.

Sakura unfocused green orbs glanced down at the tiled floor as her pale hand came to her forehead, pushing away pink bangs from her eyes. "I don't understand. You should have remembered." She then glance over at Naruto, swinging her head to face him as fast as she could, and gave the blonde an expression that seemed to be a mixture of panic and confusion. "Do you think that… maybe that's not how you died?"

Naruto turned around to face the Shinigami, his teeth bared in his anger. "I don't know! It fit. Better than anything else I thought could have happened!" The blonde spirit's rage was building up within him quickly, and he just felt like he needed to punch or throw something. His fist swung out, catching on the dull yellow curtains that hung beside Naruto's bedding. The curtain rings screeched across the metal pole, catching the attention the raven-haired boy, causing him to jump out his chair and to release Naruto's tan hand.

Both spirits stood in awe at what had just happened. Naruto looked back and forth from his fist to the 

curtains, confused as how he was able to physically move the hanging material while he was still a spirit without a body. He walked over the cement wall and placed his hand on it to see if he could still pass through the bricks and was confused and relieved when his hand did indeed pass through the wall.

"What was that, Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked, turning his attention back the pink-haired Shinigami.

But Sakura did not answer. She merely stared in horror at the moved curtains, unable to tear her green eyes away from the material as Naruto called out to her. "No…" she uttered, barely above a whisper.

"Eh? Is something wrong?"

"Naruto." Sakura said, finally regaining some of her composure. "You should not be able to do that."

"Eh?" The blonde furrowed his eyebrows together and pouted his lips in confusion. "Why not? I heard of spirits moving objects before."

"It's not that they can't move objects. It's that…" she paused, unsure if she was truly able to finished what she needed to say to the other spirit in front of her. "Spirits can only move objects, when they're ghosts."

Silence filled the room. Had the spirit been more observant of Sasuke, they would have witnessed the raven walking up to the hospital curtains and cautiously pulling them back and forth along the metal bar, testing to see if the wind could have blown them. Even though the window was closed. He refused to believe that things like this did not have a perfectly logical explanation attached to them.

Naruto's blue eyes grew wide as he stared at his pink-haired companion, her expression very serious with no sign of her being mistaken or joking around with him. Desperately to get the pink-haired woman to end her joke, he let out a nervous chuckle, but when Sakura only gave him a grave look, he stopped and felt as if he could break down at any moment. His legs felt like rubber as they gave way and let the blonde sit down along the tiled floor. He dared not looked anywhere else beside the spot on the floor that his blue eyes focused on.

"No…" his voice was soft and broken.

"But your week isn't up yet, Naruto!" Sakura yelled, feeling that they needed to do something quickly if they were going to help Naruto.

The blonde gave the Shinigami a short glance, before his dim eyes move over to focus on Sasuke, whom had pushed aside his curiosity about the curtains and returned to his spot in the chair. Naruto knew that he could not give up, but it seemed like everything was trying to keep Sasuke and himself away from each other.

The two of them had gone through so much already. And even though they had not been together for long, Naruto and Sasuke had become inseparable, like a second half to the other. Without the one, the other would be left empty and alone.

He could not leave Sasuke. He was not ready to leave him.

He rose to his feet and began to walk toward the hospital window, partially fazing his foot through the solid cement before Sakura noticed what he was doing. "W-where are you going?"

"Back to where I was shot." Naruto answered not looking back at the Shinigami as his whole body disappeared through the wall, leaving Sakura alone with Naruto's unconscious body and the silence raven sitting beside him. With a quick glance back at Sasuke and then a panicked look at the blonde's body, she then quickly took off to follow Naruto, if only to humor him in his final attempts to remember his last memory of his mortal life.

--

When Sakura had finally caught up to her blonde companion, the young boy had indeed returned back to the sidewall of Konoha High School where all of this had begun a week ago. Naruto's blue eyes momentarily stared at the blocked off section where his body had fallen down after being shot, but then hi head quickly turned away from the area.

The Shinigami wondered if Naruto felt angry or anxious when he looked at the place where, if he were to fail his mission to remember the shooting, could possibly be the scene of his death. Her thoughts faded as she then began to wonder why the tan boy was simply just looking around the courtyard-like area. Choosing to simple observe the blonde's odd behavior, Sakura leaned against a nearby tree and anxiously focused her emerald orbs on Naruto at all times.

The endless and seemingly pointless running around the area went on for no more than ten minutes before the Shinigami was completely fed up with being in the dark and doing nothing to help. She stormed up to the other spirit, her kimono sleeves fluttering behind her body with every step she took.

"Just what are you doing?" she asked, her voice laced with annoyance.

"Looking for something." Naruto answered back to the Shinigami, not even bothering to look at the pink-haired woman as he walked past her and continued to go about his business.

"Looking for what?"

"Anything." Sakura was beginning to get incredibly aggravated with the blonde's short and blunt answers. "Anything that may help us." With those finally words, Naruto walked over to a large bush that was at the very edge of the small courtyard and began to crawl amongst the leaves and twigs, which made Sakura feel as if Naruto had lost his mind in his drive to live.

Unable to watch the blonde any longer, the other spirit went off in the other direction of the blonde and began to halfheartedly search for anything that Naruto may think would be useful.

Sakura had to admit, that she did feel for the young boy. He was literally scrounging for anything that would help him remember his last memory. The Shinigami knew that Naruto was becoming increasingly desperate to recover his memory, but after everything that had gone wrong, Sakura now 

felt that all hope of Naruto living once again was lost. Understanding how awful the young boy must feel, she began to try harder to find something to help the blonde. She had come to care for him and she knew that if he were to be separated from Sasuke, he would never be happy again, in mortal life or as a spirit.

She glance along the cement covered walkways and stopped with something caught her eye. She knelt down beside a tree and began to look closely at the dirt around the giant roots. Sakura placed her pale hand along the dirt to push it away, but her fingers merely passed though the soil, which made her grumbled with irritation.

"Naruto, can you come over here for a moment." She asked, still angry that she could not push aside the dirt.

"Not now, Sakura-chan. I'm busy." He replied, his body still half way plunged into a large bush.

"Naruto." She responded in an irate tone.

"What is it now?!"

"I found something."

"Why didn't you say something before?!" Naruto shouted frantically as he rushed over to the pink-haired woman, kneeling down beside her with his fan centimeters from the dirt in front of him.

"Do you see that rusted thing sticking up?" Sakura asked pointing to a small speck of rust and silver coloring lying along the dark brown soil. Naruto nodded and reached his hand toward it, curious as to what Sakura had found.

"Try to dig it up." Sakura instructed, which the blonde eagerly obeyed as he willed his hand to move the dirt away from the object that Sakura kept pointing to with her pale index finger. Naruto grabbed a large chunk of dirt and slowly began to shift the dirt away from the small object in his hand until all that remained was the rust and silver colored object. Both pairs of eyes widened as they became glued to the object in the blonde's hand.

And it was clear to see that the object was a bullet.

Naruto pinched it in between his fingers and held it up for both Sakura and himself to see, and paused after doing so. His blue eyes widened a fraction and his whole body stiffened suddenly.

The blonde's unusual behavior went unnoticed as Sakura examined the bullet a little closer, his large emerald orbs glowing with excitement. Her finger ghosted across the surface of the bullet as she momentarily wondered how this bullet could have been overlooked when the police investigated this area. She tried to pry the bullet from Naruto's fingers, but growled in irritation when her hand simple passed through the tip of the bullet. The Shinigami mental scolded herself for trying to grab onto the mortal objects, though she should have known better after all her years of being a spirit without a physical body. She placed her hand by down to her side and just settled for looking at the slightly rusted bullet.

"Do you think that this is the bullet that pierced your chest?" she asked as her green eyes moved from the bullet in his tan fingers to look up at the blonde's face. Sakura gasped at how pale the blonde spirit had become.

Sweat dripped down his brow while his wide blue eyes seemed out of focus as they stared past the bullet. Naruto suddenly clutched his chest as his torso doubled over in pain, the bullet dropping from his hand and slipping to the cement beneath it with a soft clank. Sakura grasped onto the boy's shoulders as he began to topple forward and she let his body shift so that he was leaning mostly against her small shoulder. Her finger dug into his white button-up shirt, but taking precautions to make sure that she was not going to put Naruto in any more pain. Her frantic emerald eyes stared down at his mop of blonde hair, confused as to what had happened to the blonde spirit.

"Naruto!!" she shrieked, giving his limp body a small nudge. "Naruto!! What is it?! What happened?!" her questioned where left unanswered, but she did manage to push the blonde body back just enough so that she could look at his face, hoping that he would fill her in on what had just happened to him. But the Shinigami's only answer came from Naruto's shirt that had clutched between his fingers.

The white material was dripping with blood.

Sakura stared in horror, not sure what was happening to the tan boy's spirit. She wondered for a moment if spirits could _even_ bleed? But she then focused her thoughts back onto trying to help Naruto before he could either bleed to death (if such a thing was possible at the time being) or something worse were to happen.

His body began to fall backward onto the cement walkway, slipping from the pink-haired woman's grasp ever so slowly. Collided with the hard ground he lay there lifeless and still, his hand still weakly clutching his chest as the blood pouring from, seemingly, a fresh wound continued to drip from his flesh and soaked into the white material of his school shirt. His blue eyes grew dull and slowly, but steady closed.

"Naruto!!"

--

_Naruto leaned against the wall of the school, looking at the other three people standing beside him in the small courtyard beside Konoha High School. He sighed and turned to face them, picking up his body from leaning along the brick wall. He looked suspiciously at the three others standing before him and gave a long, heavy sigh._

"_What do you want?" he asked, his blue eyes focusing on a head of bright red hair that was standing behind his two siblings. "I haven't heard from you guys in almost a year." He scratched the back of his tan neck, rubbing it like he was trying to nonchalantly get a crick out of his muscles while he looked upon his former gang members._

"_You gotta come back." Temari pleaded to the blonde-haired boy as his blue eyes just gazed at her _

_with an unimpressed stare. "Kankuro had to open his fucking mouth and got the Akatsuki pissed with us again."_

"_Wasn't just me!" the younger boy protested, but the statement was utterly ignored by Temari as she continued to speak with Naruto._

"_We were going to go ask Zabuza and Haku(1) to help us as well, since we don't know how many they're going to bring with them to fight us, but without you we would never stand a chance." The young woman practically shouted at the tan boy, who she had notice had gone through a growth spurt over the last year or so that she had not seen or heard from him. She grumbled under her breath about how the blonde-haired teenager was not slightly taller than herself._

"_Why me?" Naruto questioned, giving Temari a confused glance._

"_Who else but you knows more about the Akatsuki and the way they operate but you!" Kankuro chirped up, hoping that he could give his shot at trying to convince the ex-gang member to rejoin the group._

_There was a short pause that settled in between the four of them. Temari and Kankuro anxiously glared at Naruto, hoping that he would give them an answer soon so that they could get away from the school building. They felt nervous being here after hours. A teacher who stayed after could walk by any minute and charge them for loitering or something along those lines._

_Gaara still remained silent and passive behind his two siblings. His hands were kept shoved in his pockets and his body was partially turned away from the other three as if he was trying to ignore the entire situation completely._

"… _No." Naruto finally answered glancing passed the brunette and the blonde to stare at the youngest of the three siblings. He wondered if the slightly shorter boy would be angry with him for not accepting his offer. Though, the blonde-haired boy could tell if the redhead even cared about the fight with the Akatsuki since he seemed to be soaking in the peaceful surroundings of the courtyard instead of listening to his brother and sister. "I won't do it."_

"_Na… Why not?!" the eldest of the three siblings demanded._

"_I… promised someone that I would never go back to that kind of life." Naruto replied a warm smile pulling on the corner of his pink lips as he thought of the very person that he had promised to never again return to the life of a yanki._

"_Bastard!" Temari's voice was laced with venom._

"_Then we'll lose. Do you want that?" Kankuro questioned, taking a step closer to the boy in front of him. "After all we've been through, you'll sleep just find knowing that you could have helped us."_

"_You're so dramatic, Kankuro." Naruto teased, pulling his chin closer to his chest so that he could look up at the brunette with his beautiful blue as and a small smirk onto his lips._

_The older boy settled for growling deep in his throat at the blonde's mocking tone and grabbed a hold of the blonde's shirt collar. "Why'd you say?" he pushed Naruto's body back against the brick wall and glared at the younger of the two, his eyes narrowed in thin slits._

"_Kankuro." Gaara finally spoke up, earning the attention of all three of the other people standing in the courtyard. "Let him go."_

_He complied, though reluctantly and backed away from the blonde and walking over to stand beside his brother, so that the urge to punch the blonde-haired boy in the face could subside and he could regain his composure. Naruto straightened out his shirt before he looked up at Temari, whom seemed both anger and worried (though Naruto never really knew exactly how Temari felt since she was very good at hiding her emotions)._

"_Gomen, Temari." He said giving the older woman a genuine apologetic smile. He hoped that she would at least forgive even if her stubborn brother did not. Though he was sure that if Gaara told him to forgive the tan boy, then Kankuro would obey._

"_It's your choice. Don't' apologize." She stated as she turned her face away from the blonde's view somewhat, hiding her pink cheeks. Naruto gave her a big grin, which made Temari's lips twitch up into a tiny smile of her own._

"_I'll see you guys later." Naruto said before he heard a loud bang ring through the entire courtyard, silencing everything for miles around so that the only sound that could be heard was the blonde-haired boy's body colliding against the cold cement. The three siblings gaze drifted from Naruto's fallen body to the source of the gun shot._

_Naruto's slowly fading vision caught sight of a bury mess of spiky red hair hiding in the bushes behind the three members of Sand. The face was too fuzzy to make out, but in the end it did not matter, for Gaara whip out a gun of his that he had tucked away in his jacket and began to fire at the figure in the bushes. The blonde did not know if the person who had shot him was injured, dead or had gotten away. The only thing that was becoming clearer in his mind the darkness that was slowly engulfing his vision._

_His dull blue eyes stared up at the sky, watching the cloud pass by, seemingly come closer to him. Naruto took a moment to turn around to make sure if he was seeing things or if he was really get closer to the white, fluffy clouds in the sky. Below him he saw the three siblings gathered around his body, steam coming the gun in Gaara's hand. Neither one of them dared to move until the sound of muffled voice began to get closer to the courtyard and shortly after they voice started up, the sound of a siren filled the entire area._

_He could not watch the seen any longer. His eyes grew too heavy._

_Slowly, Naruto closed his blue eyes and drifted off into the comforting darkness that was slowly taking away the pain that surged through his chest._

--

(1) I had to at least mention them in this story, since they didn't make it into the Sand gang.

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**Oh noes :O! I finally revealed what has happened to Naruto when he was shot. But what's happening to him now?! One mystery leads to another! :pauses: Please don't hurt me. I'll update soon. I won't leave you guys hanging. Promise!**

**Please review! I want to make it too 100 reviews!**


	15. The End

**Sorry this chapter was down for a little bit. I had trouble with the site and had to repost it. But it's still the same chapter so don't worry.**

**And so we have come to a close on this story. Wow. It's weird to see this story go. I guess that's cause I've been working on it for almost a year (including the few months a took to come up with the idea). Oh well. It can't go on forever. And I wouldn't want it to. It would lose some of its meaning if it continued on, because I would no longer have any direction for the story XP.**

**Enjoy the last chapter!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. But this story idea is 100 mine. And I was even approached by someone who asked if they could turn this plot into a comic! See Kishimoto-sensei. People like what I do with the Naruto characters. You should too.**

**Warning: Boy Love and language. Because it's the last chapter and if it didn't have this stuff in it like the others then it just wouldn't be the same XD.**

**Important: Dedicated to SasuNaru1025. I hope you've enjoyed this story as much as I have. To a friend that always made me feel like nothing was out of grasp and inspired me to continue on. Thank you. From the bottom of my heart.**

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"Could you please state your name, again?" the police officer Asuma Sarutobi asked as he stared at the group of people in front of him.

"Subaku Gaara." The redhead stated calmly as his emotionless green eyes stared at the older man in front of him. "These two are my brother and sister, Kankuro and Temari." He pointed to the taller brunette and blonde that stood to his sides, uncomfortable being in the office of a cop.

"And you're certain that this Pein person is the one responsible for the shooting of Uzumaki Naruto?" he asked placing his cigarette back in between his lips and inhaling the smoke into his lungs and then releasing it moments later.

"We say him do it with our own eyes." Temari interrupted, her voice stern and steady.

"And if that isn't enough, we also have several statements from members of Pein's gang the Akatsuki stating that they had been requested to kill Naruto before by this man's orders." Gaara then handed a stack of papers to the police officer, which did include statements from Akatsuki members. As Asuma flipped through them, he even saw that some of the members stated that they had overheard Pein talk to a follow member about killing Naruto himself.

He placed down the papers on his desk and stared wide-eyed at the three young siblings, whom all wore an expression of determination on their faces. He took his cigarette from his mouth and extinguished it in the ash tray of his cluttered desk.

"Will this serve as a proper testimony?" Gaara asked, still keeping his voice and face stoic.

"U-Un." Asuma said slowly. "This… This will be just fine. Thanks for your time. Just one question before you leave."

"Hai." The redhead said with no emotion in his voice.

"Why didn't you come forward with this information earlier?"

"We're not the most trustworthy of people." Kankuro butted in with a smirk.

"We wanted to make sure we had proof to back up our claim." Temari gave the older man a smile as her green eyes narrowed and focused on his expression. Asuma paused for another moment, feeling the tension in the room that the three siblings definitely created and then gave them a nod and smile.

"You have our thanks."

Gaara nodded and the three Sand members left the office, happy to finally be out of the police station and the uneasy feeling that came along with talking to a cop.

--

Naruto's vision remained black.

A soft and steady beeping filled his ears, giving him a small sign that something lay beyond the endless darkness that filled his vision. He tried to reach his hand outward, hoping to grasp onto something that would pull him out of the black nothingness, but his whole arm felt as heavy as lead and he only managed to raise his finger slightly.

The beeping grew louder, the darkness that surrounded him beginning to turn to a dark shade of grey instead of the endless black. The blonde became aware of a source of warmth that covered his hand and wrist, engulfing it like it was a precious and fragile object.

Another sound entered into his mind. Soft, muffled words, almost as if someone was screaming from behind a sheet of glass that separated the voice from Naruto. The warmth of his hand grew a solid form and felt as if it was another hand intertwined with his own. The grip on his hand grew tighter, as if the own whom held it was making sure that Naruto was really there.

Of course he was there. He just was not sure _where_ that was. The grey drifted into an off white color and soon that blurry white was all the tan boy could see.

The beeping sound was right beside him, the loudest that it had been ever since it had begun.

His vision focused. The blurry white that he saw all around his became that of a white ceiling, slightly discolored from years of used, more than likely. He blinked once to make sure that this too would fade into another thing or color like his vision had done several times before, but the ceiling stayed in his vision. Naruto let his heavy eyes wander down ward and he saw that he was lying on top of some sort of bed once he noticed the blanket covering his body and the metal frame along the sides of the bedding. He figured that he had been lying down for quite some time since every part of his body seemed to ache in pain and discomfort.

Naruto slightly shifted his body, which he immediately regretted for two reasons. His body was so sore that moving it sent pain throughout his entire body. And, as soon as he had moved even the slightest, he was assaulted with a loud and anxious voice, coming from his right side and practically shouting into his ear.

"Naruto?!" the familiar voice called out as the grip on his hand tightened on his hand once again.

Blue eyes widened a fraction when he heard the voice. It was a comfort to hear that voice once again. His features softened and he carefully turned his head to his right and took in the sight of person sitting beside him.

"Naruto? Y-You're awake?" Sasuke's statement meant to come out as a statement, but as his voice cracked midway through speaking the small phrase turned into an unsure question. Naruto smiled at the dark eye leering at him with such anxiety, as if he was waiting for the blonde to speak before he decided that he was actually awake and not just a dream or illusion.

"Sorry I didn't make it to school." Naruto forced out in a raspy voice as he put a warm smile on his lips. "You must have been worried sick."

Tears rolled freely down the Uchiha's face as he let out a small laugh as he leaned his face in closer toward the tired blonde. His lips grazed Naruto's forehead, giving him a short and chaste kiss as held back his urge to latch onto the boy in the bed for he was too afraid that he would only injury the blonde even more. Naruto smiled up at Sasuke, slowly raising his free hand to brush the dark locks away from Sasuke pale face. If he did not know any better he would think that the Uchiha had actually lost more color since the last time he had seen him, which he was not sure was possible.

A thought then struck the blonde. His blue eyes widened again he tried to sit, but was pushed back down onto the uncomfortable mattress by the overly worried raven. "Where am I?" he asked before he looked over to his left and noticed the many machines that sat in the corner… attached to himself. That thought did not ease Naruto's thoughts, but at least he had a better idea of where he was now.

"The hospital." Sasuke answered back, slightly more stable now that he knew that Naruto was awake.

"Of course." Naruto laughed out, wincing when he did so. His chest felt like it had been set on fire and then stabbed, which, from looking at where he was currently, might not be too far from the truth. "What happened?" he said, trying to focus on other things besides the pain in his chest.

"Don't you remember? You were shot."

Naruto paused. Sasuke words struck at some cord in the back of Naruto's mind.

"…_bullet that pierced your chest…"_ The phrase rang through his mind as if it was a long forgotten memory or a dream that he just could seem to remember. His brow furrowed in concentration as he tried to remember where he had heard that feminine voice before.

"Naruto?" Sasuke questioned, noticing the blonde's stare.

"Shot, eh?" Naruto asked mostly to himself. He then looked down at his bandaged chest and flashes on the instant of him standing outside the school with Gaara and his siblings came back to him. "Yeah that rings a bell. And it would explain why I'm here." The blonde also felt as if he had said something along those same words to someone else, but the memory was too fuzzy to make out and so he let it pass from his mind. "Does that mean I missed school today?" He gave the pale boy a wide grin as he spoke.

"You've missed an entire week." Sasuke said, slightly more serious than he had been before. "Naruto… you've been in a coma for a week."

Blue eyes widened as far as they possibly could. _"…__you are not completely dead__ …" _The same feminine voice rang through his mind once again, causing the blonde to place his large, tan hand against his forehead. _"__…y__ou're human body is in a coma__…__" _Flashes of short pink haired passed through his mind and he shook his head to get the images from his mind, so that he could think about the situation at hand.

"What is it?" Sasuke asked, obviously very concerned at the blonde's behavior.

"It's nothing." Naruto lied. "I think I had a crazy dream this week." He let out a small laugh, in which Sasuke let himself ease up slightly and laugh along with his boyfriend. It felt good hear the blonde laugh again, and Naruto could agree it was just as good to hear Sasuke laugh as well.

"I was… beginning to think you'd never wake up." Sasuke said truthfully, his grip on the blonde's hand tightening unintentionally. Naruto squeezed the pale boy's hand back and gave his lover a warm smile in reassurance.

"Me too." The blonde momentarily wondered how he thought that he was not going to wake up when the last thing he remembered was being with the other three members of his old gang, but did not dwell on it. "But I couldn't leave you."

"Damn right you couldn't." Sasuke smirked slightly, making the tan boy in the hospital bed pout slightly.

"Way to kill the mood, teme." He said, his lips jutting out in a cute pout, which made the raven laugh slightly at his boyfriend's childish behavior.

"Forgive me." He said, his voice becoming low as he leaned in his face once again, getting ever so closer to the blonde-haired boy.

"Just this once." Naruto joked as the two boys' lips collided into a kiss that showed how desperate Sasuke had needed Naruto to return back to him and how much Naruto had wanted to return.

And that in that moment, Naruto could all the passion and love of their relationship and the memories that led them to this point rush back to him as if he had at one point forgotten all of it.

--

Sakura floated outside of the hospital window, a kind and warm smile appearing on her red lips as she glanced through the glass sheet to see Naruto and Sasuke reunite once again.

She had been worried back when Naruto had begun to fade away again when they were back at the courtyard and she had thought that she would simply bring him back to Tsunade once again. But before she could do anything, the blonde's spirit has taken on an almost mist-like form and quickly flew off toward the hospital.

The pink-haired Shinigami had hurried off to follow Naruto's spirit, off what she believe to be Naruto's spirit and had stopped when it passed through the hospital wall. She had frantically peered through the window, hoping that Naruto had not become a ghost that would be forced to wander the Earth forever. But instead she found Naruto slowly opening his blue eyes and Sasuke sitting up and leaning over the semi-conscious boy, so joyful that he had woken up.

There were no words for how happy she was for Naruto at that moment. He had been reunited with the person he loved more than anything else in the world and escaped the hands of death on several occasions.

The young woman had to admit that she was slightly upset by the fact that Naruto did not remember the time that he spent as a spirit. The past week that Sakura had spent with the blonde-haired boy had been some of the happiest times she could remember. She hated to admit it, but she was slightly upset to see the tan boy alive. It meant that she would never see him again.

A sigh escaped from her lips as she mentally scolded herself. "You should not be upset. You're job was to help he live again, remember?" she said to herself.

She glanced once again into the window and could not help but smile when she saw Naruto and Sasuke simply latching onto one another, just relishing in the presence of the other boy and making up for lost time. It was then that she was absolutely sure that this is how things should be. Naruto and Sasuke obviously belonged together. If the time she had spent with the blonde not been enough to prove that her, then seeing them together would remove any and all doubt that she could have possibly had. A smile appeared on her lips once again.

Suddenly a pair of blue eyes opened up and glanced over at Sakura through the glass window. Sakura gasped for it really did look like Naruto was starring straight at her. She wondered if it was at all possible that the blonde really _did_ see her. Or was it just her imagination?

Naruto smiled and then Sasuke pulled away and looked in the same direction as his boyfriend, wondering at what he was starring. "Naruto? What is it?"

"It's gonna sound weird, but…" Naruto paused to turn his attention away from the window so that he could stare back at his boyfriend. "I think I saw an angel outside the window."

"You're delusional." Sasuke smirked pulling him back into a hug, as he was reminded of the first time that he had met the blonde-haired boy.

"Un. Maybe."

Naruto glanced out the window again, but the "angel" he had seen had vanished from sight.

Sakura had hidden herself behind the hospital wall, surprised that Naruto had actually seen her outside the window. She blushed slightly in shock and slightly embarrassment that he had caught her looking so happy and then surprising her like that.

The Shinigami shook her head and then began to float up toward the sky. She stole one final glance down at the shrinking hospital building and gave a wide grin toward the building and the boy within it.

"Till we meet again, Naruto." She said softly before she disappeared off into the white clouds.

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**Aw. Wasn't it a cute ending? I originally had the part about Gaara going to the police after Naruto had noticed Sakura, but I was like… "I want this to have a cuter ending than that." NOT THAT GAARA ISN'T CUTE o – o!! But you know what I mean…. Right?**

**Thanks again for reading this! I had a fun time writing this story, so I hope you enjoyed reading it. Oh and since I really want to make it too 100 reviews, I'll write up an oneshot for the person who gives me the 100****th**** review. Sound good?**

**Okay! Until next time!**

**Owari!**


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